


The Journey

by Emmaj26



Category: Legend of Zelda, The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Majora's Mask, Ocarina of Time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:01:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 41,679
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26481571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emmaj26/pseuds/Emmaj26
Summary: *Sequel of In His Shadow*Two years after Link was returned to his own timeline after defeating Ganon, he leaves Hyrule to embark on a personal, secret journey to find something that was lost to him. After a strange encounter in the Lost Woods, he stumbles into the strange land of Termina. Years later, his older brother, Dark sets out on a journey throughout the land of Hyrule as he comes to terms with a loss of his own.
Kudos: 1





	1. Time

_The Lost Woods_

Early morning fog shrouded the forest. After the night’s rains, the air was cool and fresh smelling, the tang of wet leaves and damp earth.

In the murk and stillness, the muted hoofbeats of his young horse did not echo. They rode on through the trees, following an unseen path without guidance. His head was held low; he didn’t bother watching where he was being led.

In a clearing there was a shallow pond, and Epona, the filly, rerouted for a drink. Link, the rider, patted her neck with his left hand while he loosely held the reins in his other. Lifting her head abruptly, Epona snorted and pawed at the ground.

Hoping to soothe her nervousness, Link murmured quietly, stroking her sleek neck. 

The woods were notorious to travelers. There were stories. Disappearances.

Link didn’t share Epona’s nerves. These woods were his first home. He’d grown up here. They’d been traveling through them for days without incident. Sleeping on the forest floor without care.

Link urged Epona on after she’d finished her drink, letting his mind drift once more. He’d hoped returning here would help him with his troubles. For the past two years, Link had committed himself to his path.

He’d warned the land of Hyrule of the coming danger, protected the people he’d sworn to protect. All had been well. His mission succeeded, Link had settled in his new home in Hyrule.

But in all those months, something had been tugging, nagging at his heart. Pulling him away. Deepening a chasm within him. Some force pushed him to find whatever was missing—and whatever it was lay outside of Hyrule.

With his few possessions in hand, Link bid farewell to his friends and set off for the forest, where his heart had taken him.

Back in the home of his childhood, he’d been disappointed again. The one he’d searched for wasn’t there.

The trees were becoming denser; Epona slowed her steps. The faint bell-like tinkling of a fairy’s wings sounded, close by. Link turned his head, surprised—could it be? Pulling Epona to a stop, Link searched the closest trees for a tell-tale glow. Without warning, two fairies zoomed in front of Epona’s nose, startling her. Rearing up, she neighed in alarm.

Thrown from the horse, Link tumbled to the dirt, striking his head on a rock and knocking himself out.

The two fairies, one with pale yellow wings and the other with deep purple edged with red, hovered above the unconscious Link.

In the shadows of the forest, a skullkid appeared. Shuffling forwards, he chuckled gleefully and spoke in a child’s voice.

“You two did great!”

The two fairies swooped happily in the air. “I wonder if he has anything valuable?” the darker fairy asked.

The skullkid gave Link’s unconscious form a kick, then bent down to search his belongings when he saw no response. The imp’s nimble fingers closed on a small, smooth object—a pale blue ocarina.

“Wow, how pretty!” the yellow fairy exclaimed.

“Let me try it!” the dark fairy said excitedly.

The skullkid tweeted a few discordant notes, collapsing into giggles at hearing the funny noises made by the instrument.

Roused by the sound, Link sat up, rubbing the sore spot on his head. Seeing the skullkid with his ocarina in hand, he jumped up.

“Hey! Give that back!”

With a yelp, the imp dodged Link’s tackle, leaping into the air and landing on Epona’s back. Alarmed, she reared, but couldn’t dislodge her unwelcome passenger. Link spun around. The imp, like others of his kind, was a mere child, but his body was wooden, his clothes too small and worn out. His face hidden by an unusual mask with eerie orange eyes and no mouth. 

Growing up in the woods, Link had known skullkids to be spirits of lost children, forever causing mischief and playing tricks, but otherwise harmless and sometimes friendly. Many of them liked to wear masks, but none as unnerving as this one.

With a whoop, the skullkid gave Epona a kick in the sides. She took off, and Link leapt at him, latching on to his leather boots.

Dragged along by the galloping horse, Link tried to hang on. As they careened through the maze of trees, the undergrowth thickened, and Link lost his grip. The skullkid sped away on Epona, cackling all the way until he disappeared into a cave up ahead.

Back on his feet, Link gave chase. The two fairies glowed like beacons in the tunnel, leading the way. When their light vanished, Link pushed harder, not wanting to lose Epona or the precious ocarina the skullkid had stolen.

His feet landed on air, and Link plummeted, his stomach flying into his throat as he dropped. He landed in water, inhaling in surprise. Kicking his legs, Link lunged for the surface, coughing up the water he’d swallowed.

Mocking laughter reached him, and Link looked up across the pool to where the skullkid and his two fairy companions waited near another tunnel mouth. Wading to the shallow end, Link saw the imp seemed to be floating on a cushion of air, his thin arms crossed over his body, the disturbing mask’s eyes glowing.

“That horse of yours is so stupid!” he complained with a huff. “I did you a favour and got rid of it.”

Link reeled back in shock, making the skullkid laugh nastily again.

“Boo hoo!” he mocked Link. “I was just having some fun, that’s all. I’m sure your horse is wandering the woods somewhere...”

Gritting his teeth, Link reached for the Kokiri sword at his back. “Give back what you took,” he demanded. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

The skullkid became still, but the eyes on the mask he wore began to glow brighter. It was a heart-shaped mask, with two spikes protruding from the rounded top and four more on each side of the pointed bottom. It had been painted with strange designs on the front and was curved around the edges, so it completely enclosed the wearer’s face.

Those spooky eyes fixed on Link, twin orange-yellow orbs with a thin layer of bright green around the pupils. The mask began to shake, letting out a wooden rattling noise.  
The hair on the back of Link’s neck spiked when the wave of dark magical energy hit him. Whatever that thing was, it was no mere mask.

Pain sizzled through his body as the evil magic of the mask sunk in. Link tightened his grip on the sword, fighting against the throbbing in his head, resisting. 

Link blinked, and the skullkid and the two fairies were gone. Replacing them was a dozen deku scrubs, converging on him, surrounding him. They glared at him with their unearthly orange, pupil-less eyes, getting closer and closer.

Link turned and ran. His sword was forgotten, his breath loud in his ears as he kept running, running. The laughter of the skullkid followed him. The pupil-less eyes of the deku scrubs became the horrible, glowing eyes of Ganon, glaring down at Link as he reared back to strike.

He was trapped in a nightmare with no escape. A dream he couldn’t wake from. He kept running until his steps faltered and he fell to his knees. Link pressed his hands to head, willing the unwanted memories to go away, for the pain to recede.

The darkness pulled back. The throbbing in his head faded. The skullkid and his two fairies were back.

Link found himself kneeling at the edge of the pool of water, staring in disbelief at his own reflection. Instead of his own face, he saw the appearance of a deku scrub wearing his clothes. Link pulled back in alarm, lifting hands now made of wood to his face. 

“W-what did you do to me!?”

Too busy laughing, the skullkid floated away into the tunnel, his fairies with him. Link stood up and ran after them, only to be prodded back by the yellow fairy, who wrinkled her nose in a sneer and told him to stay put.

Turning, the pale fairy looked to her dark-winged friend, just as the skullkid’s mask shuddered once more, causing vines to sprout from the dirt and weave themselves into an impenetrable barrier.

“Sis!” the dark fairy cried out in alarm.

“No!” the yellow fairy screamed, trying in vain to find a spot to pass through the vines. “Wait for me! Skull Kid, you left me behind!”

“It’s no use,” Link told her. “They’ve gone.”

She whirled on Link. “You’re the reason I’ve been separated from my brother!” she howled. “Do something!”

Scowling at her, he asked, “What should I do, exactly?”

“Hack the vines apart! Light a fire! Anything!”

“I’m made of wood!” Link growled. “And I can’t use my sword anymore, thanks to your friend. He stole all my stuff when he took my horse.”

The fairy groaned dramatically and rolled her eyes. “Okay, I’m sorry! I’m sorry for all that! Just please help me! Help me get back to my brother and I’ll tell you where to find Skull Kid, deal?”

“Sure,” Link said caustically. “You know where he’s gone to?”

“I have an idea where he’ll be,” she hedged. “Now, come on, we need to move!”

While she flitted around in a panic, Link realized they were inside the hollow trunk of an enormous tree, not a cavern. Looking around with a practiced eye, Link spotted the hole in the tree several metres above the wall of vines. 

While he started to climb the insides of the tree with clumsy hands, the yellow fairy hovered nearby.

“I guess we’re partners until we catch up with Skull Kid. I’m Tatl, by the way.”

“Link.”

“That’s a weird name.”

Link sighed and tried to find the next foothold. Despite having a deku scrub’s wooden body, his eyesight, even in the near-darkness, was much better, and he was lighter. After several minutes he made it to the hole in the tree’s trunk, and hopped down into yet another cavern.

“Have you done this before?” Tatl asked as Link forged ahead into the cave.

Link chuckled to himself as another barrage of memories burst into his head. He marched ahead, Tatl trailing behind. When he came to a mossy tunnel, he could hear running water up ahead. The walls here were deliberately shaped, the stone cut into precise blocks. Through the doorway at the end was a sewer tunnel running perpendicular to Link’s, with a small, rusted bridge arching across the water and upwards into another chamber. In the river was a rotating water wheel, attached to a wooden beam.

Link followed the spiraling ramp, emerging into a wide room with a stone floor and wooden ceiling. In the middle, a wooden pole protruded from the floor and stretched on through the ceiling, spinning ceaselessly, operating an unseen mechanism on the level above.

Curious as to where he was, Link headed for the square doors opposite the bridge.

“Oh my...you’ve met with a terrible fate.”

The voice was quiet, a bit unsettling, but laced with sympathy. Link spun around. Tatl gasped and crowded behind Link’s back.

A red-haired man in a long violet coat stood in the shadows, burdened by a heavy rucksack on his back. He stepped towards Link, hands held out in a welcoming gesture. The man was familiar to Link, though he wasn’t sure why.

“I own the Happy Mask Shop,” the man explained with a toothy smile. “I am traveling in search of unique and special masks.”

Link relaxed as recognition hit him. He had met the Happy Mask Salesman before—in another place, and another time.

The salesman leaned down to peer into Link’s face, putting him on edge again. He hummed to himself, scratching his chin idly.

“I see you and I have met with the same villain,” the salesman said. “An imp in the woods stole one of my masks from me.”

“He’s stolen something of mine, as well,” Link told him, glancing over his shoulder at Tatl.

The salesman’s gaze raked over Link’s face. “Indeed...if you are able to retrieve this item from the imp, I know a way to return you to your former self,” he offered. “In exchange...I ask that you also return the mask that was stolen from me.”

An image of the mask the skullkid had worn flashed before Link’s eyes. The rest of the salesman’s words registered.

“You know this isn’t my true form?” Link asked.

The salesman’s cheery smile froze. “I know the signs of dark magic,” he said softly. “Fortunately, I know of some cures as well.” He extended one long, pale hand to Link. “Do we have a deal?”

Link placed his new twig-like hand in the salesman’s. The mask salesman’s grin widened.

“Excellent,” he murmured. “I’m counting on you.”

With Tatl at his shoulder, Link turned away from the unsettling salesman and pushed open the door with an echoing creak. 

Outside, dawn was breaking.

**********

_Hyrule, many years later..._

Night was falling. 

Cursing, Dark set down his pack and wrenched it open, pulling out the lantern. The plan was to make Gerudo Fortress before sunset, and clearly that wouldn’t happen. Resettling his pack over his shoulders, Dark lit the lantern wick.

The canyon pass loomed ahead of him, ominous with the fading light. Dark didn’t relish entering Gerudo territory at nighttime, but spending the evening in the pass wasn’t ideal, either.

He could only hope the guards were likely to shoot him on sight.

Twilight bathed the canyon in navy and indigo, with only a sliver of golden red visible overhead. In the canyon he was isolated, cut off from the rest of the world. Alone.

When he’d decided on this journey, Link had offered to go with him, but Dark had insisted. Link wasn’t happy to see him leave, but he respected Dark’s wishes.

Fierce had tried to talk him out of it as well, but Dark wasn’t keen on hearing anything Fierce had to say.

It was better this way, Dark decided. Better to go it alone.

More than an hour’s drudge later, the sound of running water greeted his ears. He’d made it to the river—the boundary between Hyrule and Gerudo territory. From the northern mountains, the Hylia river poured across the country, down through the plains, Castle Town and on into the Gerudo Canyon, bisecting its east-to-west pass through a deep crack in the rock.

Two rows of lit torches flickered in the darkness, guiding him to the bridge across the chasm he couldn’t see. On the other side, a Gerudo encampment.

Far below, the river raged on into a waterfall before it made its way through the rest of the pass on its way to Lake Hylia.

Slowly, his lantern held high to illuminate his face, Dark approached the close side of the bridge. The Gerudo guards, having heard him coming, already had their spears at the ready.

“Halt,” the first guard commanded.

“I’m a friend,” Dark called back, repeating the message in the Gerudo language. “A friend of Nabooru’s.”

“You have no business here, Hylian. Go away.”

Confused, Dark tried again. “It’s important that I speak to Nabooru.”

He took a step forward, and the guards sprang into action. The first one walloped him with the end of her spear while the second pounced, jabbing the sharp end towards his throat.

“On your knees,” the second guard ordered. “Don’t move.”

Frowning, Dark did as she asked, lifting his hands behind his head. The first guard disarmed him while several more crossed the bridge, weapons raised. The woman at the front drew near, and Dark recognized her face in the torchlight.

“Imara.”

The Gerudo captain fixed hawk like eyes on him. The guard with her spear at his neck pricked him threateningly.

Imara glared down at him. “Take him to the tents,” she ordered, turning her back on him.

“Imara,” Dark tried again. “I need to speak with Nabooru. I’m a friend. Don’t you recognize me?”

Ignoring him, she continued across the bridge, her guards dragging him along after tying his hands behind his back.

Puzzled, Dark wondered at her lack of recognition. Link and Zelda had kept their memories from the other timeline, the lost years. Impa and Darunia, the Sages, retained their memories as well. A sudden thought struck Dark. What if Nabooru didn’t remember him?

Hylian and Gerudo relations weren’t outright hostile, as they had been when Ganondorf was their leader, but for some the execution of their king was still fresh, and Nabooru herself hadn’t visited Hyrule in some time.

Dark’s guards pushed him into one of the tents on the other side of the canyon, tying him to the centre post and departing without a word. Sighing, he leaned his head back against the wood.

Dark, like Link, Zelda and the other Sages, had kept his memories of the Imprisoning War, the span of seven years during which Ganondorf had ruled Hyrule as the King of Evil, until Link had awakened as the Hero of Time, freeing the Sages and defeating Ganondorf. 

For what reason he remembered, he did not know. Another secret truth Fierce had refused to share with him.

A Gerudo entered the tent. She was a teenage girl, dressed in simple clothes instead of a warrior’s garb, carrying a cup of water. Her eyes widened in shock when she looked at him, and Dark lowered his gaze from her face.

Looking into his eyes tended to scare people. Along with his unwelcome memories of the other time, Dark had kept the curse the sorcerer Alatar, had inflicted on him. As a result, Dark’s irises remained a frightening crimson instead of their natural deep blue.

The girl spoke a few words in Gerudo, lifting the cup in trembling hands.

Not understanding what she said, Dark motioned with his chin for her to put it down. With clear relief, she did so, immediately backing away from him and out of the tent.  
A few moments later, Imara entered the tent, her expression unreadable.

“Who are you?”

“A friend,” he insisted again. “I’ve come to speak to Nabooru. My name is Dark.”

Imara crossed her arms over her chest. “We know no one by that name.”

He blew out a frustrated breath. “You do, you just don’t remember for some reason. Just let Nabooru see me—she'll tell you I am who I say I am.”

Imara snorted. “You think I’m stupid enough to let you within sight of our queen? You could be a Hylian assassin.”

“I’m not here to kill anyone!” he growled. “Hyrule has no quarrel with the Gerudo.”

At Imara’s arched brow, Dark thunked his head against the pole in irritation, racking his brain for a suitable way of proving his claims. 

“You and I fought once, surely you remember that? No? Okay...” A memory surfaced. “I know,” he grinned in triumph. “Nabooru and I are such good friends, she gave me a gift once.”

Imara’s red brow climbed even higher. “A gift?”

“Yes, she once gave me a gift of ice arrows. She told me they were special, or something...”

Imara’s arms dropped. “What did you say?”

“Ice arrows?”

She was at his side in a flash, the edge of her dagger pressed against his side. “If you’re lying, Hylian--”

“I’m not,” he insisted. “She did once give them to me. Ask her.”

Imara sheathed the dagger. “We’ll bring you tomorrow. For tonight, you’ll stay here, until I can verify your story.”

“Can I at least untie my hands?”

With a quicksilver flick of her wrist, Imara sliced through the bonds around his wrists. Imara moved to the tent flap, speaking softly to her guards to bring something to eat. With a last suspicious look at him, she left.

Within minutes the Gerudo girl had returned with a plate of food, accompanied by two guards who watched him eat before escorting the girl back outside. Dark knew he would be watched all night, but they were wasting their efforts. He had no intention of escaping.

Tomorrow, with any luck, he would meet with Nabooru, she would remember him, and he would be able to convince her to help him.

If she refused to help, it didn’t really matter anyway. Dark needed to cross the desert. He needed an answer.

He would go alone.

The guards woke him the next morning, securing ropes around his hands once more. The march back to the fortress was uneventful, though Dark’s guards always kept one eye on him.

He didn’t need to wait long to see Nabooru. The Gerudo leader was outside the fortress, talking with one of her captains and overseeing a training drill the Gerudo warriors were holding. She wasn’t the type of woman to sit on a throne all day.

Catching sight of them, Nabooru’s brow furrowed and she dismissed her captain.

“Imara,” Nabooru called. “Why is this man bound?”

Surprised, Imara muttered a few words in Gerudo unfamiliar to Dark.

Nabooru smirked at him. “Nice to see you again, Dark.”

He arched a brow. “You too.”

Imara untied his hands and tossed the rope to a guard. She shot Dark an irritated look, as if his telling the truth about who he was were an inconvenience. Calling to his guard posse, Imara bowed respectfully to Nabooru before the group left the way they’d come.

“Well come inside, then,” she prodded, turning for the nearest door. 

Inside the fortress was sparse but homey, with minimal furnishings but plenty of Gerudo-made rugs and tapestries to warm the surroundings. She led Dark into a small room littered with cushions and shrouded with rugs, with a single wide window to let in the light.

Settling onto a large red cushion, Nabooru helped herself to a clay jug and poured two cups, handing him one. Dark took a seat opposite her and accepted it. 

“Did you come on foot?” she asked, eyeing his travel-dusted tunic and trousers.

Dark shrugged. “Don’t have a horse.”

“Well, we can fix that,” she replied, waving an absent hand. “Now, to business. I assume you came here for a reason.”

“I need a favour.”

“Hmm.” Nabooru set aside her cup. “As you’re an honourary member of the Gerudo, I am happy to do this.” Her tawny eyes glinted. “But I have to say I’m curious.”

Dark watched her over the rim of his cup, wary of the answer. “About what?”

Nabooru crossed her arms, frowning at him in disapproval. “The last time I saw you, you’d run off to face Ganondorf on your own right before the battle. Then time—” she snapped her fingers “—goes back again, and Link sends me the message you’re alive and well. Which was a great relief, by the way, not that you cared to tell me yourself.”

Dark winced. “It’s been difficult, since I got back,” he hedged.

Nabooru’s gaze softened with sympathy. “I understand.” When he stared listlessly into his cup, she clapped her hands to her knees. “Now, tell me what this favour is.”

Dark placed his cup on the floor. “I need a way to contact the dead.”

“And you think I have a way to do that?” She gaped at him.

“You’re the Sage of Spirit.”

“Being a Sage doesn’t mean I have knowledge of such things.”

Dark sighed in frustration. “Zelda told me there is a way to contact the spirits of the dead at the Spirit Temple. I was hoping for your help in doing so.”

Nabooru toyed with the end of her crimson ponytail. “Hmm. Personally, I try not to put any stock into ancient rituals no one’s tried to perform in eons,” she said, then shrugged. “But who am I to argue with the guardian of the Triforce of Wisdom?”

“So you’ll help me?”

“I’ll try,” she said. “No promises.”

“Thank you.”

Her smile grew. “I ask only two things in return.”

He chuckled. “Should have known,” he muttered.

Nabooru’s grin turned wicked. “First, tell me you’ll stay here a while with us. I don’t like to be used for my favours and then abandoned at the first opportunity.”

Dark smirked. “Fine, I agree. And the second?”

“Tell me what happened to you the night before the battle.”

Dark stiffened. “No.”

“It can’t hurt to talk about it,” she encouraged. “I don’t think you’ve dealt with what happened.”

“What’s there to talk about?” he snapped. “What’s there to deal with? I failed. I failed her, I failed my parents. I failed Link. Then time went back again and—” he cut himself off with a growl, snatching his cup off the floor and flinging at the nearest wall.

Nabooru watched him for a moment, drawing a deep, slow breath. “Five,” she said.

Dark glanced at her. “What?”

“I lost many of my sisters in the battle against Ganondorf,” she said. “Each one was an unbearable loss. But then we woke up seven years in the past. Suddenly, everyone we had lost was returned to us.”

His heart clenched in his chest, remembering the elation of finding Sienna alive again, seven years younger, with no memory of the horrors she’d experienced. Then the grief crushed him.

“Five of those we’d regained,” Nabooru continued, “were lost to us again when they sickened with the cursed illness.” Reaching out, she carefully patted his hand. “I understand, Dark.”

He let his chin drop against his chest, not wanting her to see the tears that threatened to come loose. Sienna had come back to him. They had had precious little time together, and then she’d been gone again in a matter of days.

The illness had swept through Hyrule, taking some of those who had died in the alternate time. Somehow, others had been lucky. Zelda’s father still lived, though he had been slain by Ganondorf in the other time.

But Dark’s love had been cruelly taken from him for a second time.

“You want to know what happened?” he asked, curling his hands into fists. “I went there because Alatar threatened her life. He tried to take control of me through the curse. When I resisted, he killed her. Ganondorf nearly killed me. Then, everything was reset, and some bastard decided I hadn’t suffered enough.” Dark laughed humourlessly. “So I had to watch her die all over again. And I still carry around this…evil inside me. The very reason she’s gone in the first place.”

“Dark…”

Abruptly he stood up, turning from Nabooru’s sympathetic gaze. Tossing aside the colourful veil blocking the door, Dark wandered aimlessly through the fortress until he found a deserted corner.

His heart pounded against his ribs. His head throbbed, his eyes stung. Dark leaned against the wall, pressing his knuckles against his forehead and gritting his teeth.  
When he’d awoken in the past with the curse still with him, he’d thought it worse than the burden of memory. All too soon, he realized that there was no heavier weight than loss. It consumed him more wholly than vengeance ever had.

Sliding down to the floor, Dark curled his knees up, placed his hands over his head and let out his grief.

**********

Midnight was nearing.

Link watched the giant clockface as it ticked away the seconds, the minutes, on the great tower. Reaching high into the sky, it was a beacon of stone and wood in the centre of South Clocktown, and the focus of everyone who remained in the town tonight.

The air was heavy with anticipation, skewered by a spike of fear. Those who had stayed had not all remained by choice. Some were there out of duty.

Link scanned the crowd of town guards around the square, their anxious faces turned upwards. They were there to protect the citizens too stubborn to leave and aid the ones who wished to evacuate.

A quake rumbled through the square, shaking the ground. Some of the guards tightened their grips on their spears. Link braced himself against an abandoned market stall.  
It was nearly time. It was nearly midnight.

Above the clocktower, the moon loomed at hundreds of times its normal size—a colossal hunk of rock waiting to hurtle onto them all.

The clock shifted with a dull shushing noise; the bell inside rung out. On cue, the planned fireworks erupted into the sky, hailing the climax of the Carnival of Time.

Whispers exploded as the guards looked as one towards the clocktower and the menacing moon, certain it would fall any second. Link waited while the clock rose along the length of the tower, the pendulum at the top of the mechanism falling backwards so the clock’s face pointed towards the sky, greeting the moon.

Above the tower’s doors, the very same Link had first come into Clocktown through, a staircase was revealed. Next to him, Tatl shivered, her wings shaking. Without waiting for her to follow, Link walked up to the clocktower, and began to climb.

Three days earlier, Link had walked out of the clocktower after his encounter with the Happy Mask Salesman and into Clocktown, Termina.

At first, the town had been like any other—almost familiar in its similarities to Castle Town in Hyrule. Bustling, bright, lively. Through speaking to some of its citizens, the town guards and even the town’s mayor, Link had learned the town was celebrating its annual carnival. 

Unfortunately for the people of Termina, the skullkid was wreaking havoc. Tatl had finally admitted it was skullkid who’d used dark magic to summon the moon, threatening to drop it and cause untold destruction and death.

At the top of the tower, Link and Tatl walked out onto the clock’s painted surface, just beneath the enormous moon. Hovering in the air, tossing the Ocarina of Time carelessly in one hand, was the forest imp who was causing so much trouble.

The spooky-eyed mask was firmly in place. Link studied it, a frisson of unease prickling the back of his neck. He suspected the mask was the reason he had gone to such lengths of terror and evil.

“Skull Kid!” Tatl shouted, flying between Link and the skullkid. “Enough of the games! It’s time to give back what you took.”

He didn’t change position, but he spoke with a sneer in his voice. “No! I need it. I’m not giving it back.”

The dark-winged fairy whizzed from behind the skullkid. “Sis!”

“Tael!” Tatl exclaimed. “You’re safe!”

“Swamp. Mountain. Ocean. Canyon,” Tael began, pronouncing the words slowly and clearly. “Bring the four—”

The skullkid reared back and slapped the fairy aside. “Stupid fairy!” he growled, his childish voice becoming inhumanly low and savage.

“What are you doing!?” Tatl shrieked. “Leave me brother alone!”

“Whatever,” he mumbled, his voice returned to normal. “They can’t hurt me anyways,” he added gleefully. “Not now that I can do this!”

Throwing his head back, the skullkid let loose a jarring howl. Waves of dark energy surrounded him, just as before, and the mask on his face began to shake, its orange eyes glowing. He thrust his arms skyward, directing the sinister magic he’d summoned upward.

Ever so slowly, the moon began to descend.

Tatl screamed. Tael called out to his sister, trying to reach her, but the magical aura surrounding the skullkid pushed him back.

Thinking quickly, Link noticed the skullkid had loosened his grasp on the ocarina and reached for a deku nut from his pocket. As a deku scrub he couldn’t lift a sword or use his own magic, but he knew from experience that deku nuts could be surprisingly effective.

Link hurled the nut at the skullkid, striking him. Dazed, the skullkid stopped yowling, his arms going slack at his sides. He dropped the instrument, where it clattered to the ground.

Link dove, snatching it up before Skull Kid could retaliate.

“What are you doing!?” Tatl wailed.

Link lifted the ocarina in his hands, realizing he wouldn’t be able to play it as a deku scrub. Its polished, pale surface reflected his unfamiliar appearance.

In his hands, it started to thrum softly, some ancient enchantment within it responding. In a flood of images, memories of the person who had gifted it to him came rushing back.  
_Zelda..._

Link remembered their sad farewell before he left Hyrule, his promise to return when he found what he was searching for. He remembered her placing the instrument in his hands, entrusting him with her most prized possession for the second time. From somewhere farther away, a melody echoed, powerful and enduring.

Zelda had played the song for him before he’d left Hyrule. She had played it before saying goodbye, before she’d sent him back in time.

“Link!”

Shaken from his memories by Tatl’s anxious voice, Link realized he hadn’t imagined hearing the Song of Time—it sounded now, at the top of the clocktower, washing over everything, drowning it all out. The notes ripples in the river of time.

Whiteness enveloped him. Link thought he was spinning, or maybe falling. The final notes faded back into memory, and Link opened his eyes.

He stood in front of the clocktower’s doors, watching the busy thrum of the South Clocktown marketplace. Workers milled about, preparing for the carnival, while others did their shopping, talked with their friends and neighbours.

“What...” Tatl said, hovering next to him. “What just happened?”

Link stared. “We went back in time,” he murmured, awed. In his wooden fingers he clutched the ocarina, safe and sound.

He craned his head back. The moon loomed overhead, much further away than it had been a few seconds ago.

“Who are you!?” Tatl gaped at him. “What are you? That instrument...that song was so odd...” She trailed off, bobbing to and fro. “Wait! The mask salesman said if you got your instrument back from Skull Kid he could return you to normal!”

Link’s gaze darted to the clocktower door. Tatl whizzed around excitedly.

“Let’s go!”

Link burst through the door, perplexed at seeing the salesman exactly where he’d left him. In a way, Link was the one who’d just left.

The salesman grinned. “Back so soon?”

He raised the ocarina for the salesman to see. “I got it back. The instrument the skullkid took from me.”

“Wonderful!” The salesman clapped his hands, then extended them for the ocarina. “May I?”

The salesman accepted the ocarina from Link, lifting it to his lips to play a melody. The song was unusual, part soothing lullaby, part mournful lament. A profound sense of relief swept through Link, as though a stone weighing down his heart had been lifted away.

His arms went lax, his eyes drifted shut; he was between sleepfulness and waking. A dull clatter roused him from the lingering effects of the music.

Looking down, Link saw a wooden mask at his feet, featuring the appearance of a deku scrub. Exhaling sharply, Link held out his hands in front of him, wanting to shout in relief and joy at seeing his human self was returned.

The salesman smiled down at him, holding out the ocarina.

“Thank you!” Link told him, taking the precious item back.

“This melody heals troubled spirits,” the salesman explained, “Turning them into masks, locking the essence inside.” Bending, the man picked up the mask and held it out. “I give this mask to you. Whenever you wear it, you may take its form again at your will. There is no longer any danger.”

Link took the mask, studying the wooden face, the drooping eyes of the deku scrub. 

“Now,” the salesman continued, “I believe you have a mask to return to me as well.”

Link froze. Tatl groaned. Link hung his head, ashamed to admit he hadn’t been able to retrieve the skullkid’s mask.

The salesman’s cheerful expression morphed to one of fury in an instant. “You didn’t get the mask!?” he seethed.

Without warning he snatched Link by the shoulders, shaking him so hard his teeth rattled inside his gums.

“Have you any idea the calamity that will be unleashed!” the salesman howled. Running out of breath, he panted, “That mask...it is called Majora’s Mask. It is a cursed, evil item, capable of bestowing terrifying powers on the one who wears it. Long ago, it was sealed away by the ancient ones to prevent it from bringing catastrophe.”

“Then why did you have it?” Tatl snapped. “When Skull Kid took it from you, he had no way of knowing it was evil! And now it’s possessing him or something!” She huffed, turning to Link. “He wasn’t always like that...”

“I went to great personal risk to get that mask!” the salesman retorted. “It took me decades to find it, the mask of legend. And then that imp took it!” He rounded on Link. “Please, you must get it back! Before something terrible happens...”

“Something terrible already did happen!” Tatl yelled. “Or...it will happen. It hasn’t yet...or--aahh!”

“I’ll get it back for you,” Link said.

Tatl and the salesman looked at him.

“Of course!” the salesman exclaimed, patting Link on the shoulder. “You’ll do fine. Believe in your courage, young man. I know you can do it.”

Tatl snorted. Link glared at her. Bidding the salesman farewell, Link and Tatl turned for the door.

“How are we supposed to get the mask back in three days!?” Tatl hissed in Link’s ear. “Three days from now, the skullkid will drop the moon on us all over again!”

Link lifted the ocarina in his left hand. “Now that I’m human again, I can use this to turn back time whenever we need,” he explained. “It will be fine, you’ll see.”

Tatl, skeptical, asked, “How do you know it’ll work again?”

Link shrugged. “I don’t for sure, but it’s not the first time I’ve done this.”

“It isn’t?”

“Now, what was that thing Tael said about a swamp, a mountain?”

Tatl huffed out a breath. “I’m not sure...but he said we needed to bring the four.” She paused. “Do you think he knows of a way to stop Skull Kid and that Majora’s Mask thing?”

“He was probably trying to tell us something,” Link reasoned.

“Well, you’re the expert.”

Ignoring the jibe, Link said, “We should see if we can find out more about the four locations Tael mentioned.”

“There’s a swamp south of Clocktown,” Tatl said.

Link scowled. “You might have mentioned that earlier.”

“Come on, I know the way.”

Link glanced around the marketplace. “I need to grab some supplies for the journey first.”

“Fine, but then we go to the southern swamp.”

By midday, Link and Tatl were on their way out of Clocktown, the lush green plains of Termina ahead of them, the looming moon above them, and the long journey ahead.


	2. Desert

When Link and Tatl reached the edge of the swamp the sun was steadily rising in the east. While Link navigated his way from the well-worn roads and into the indistinct paths, Tatl loudly wondered how they were going to accomplish everything they needed to in three days.

Tuning her out for the most part, Link trusted the Ocarina’s enchantment to help with the issue of giving them the time they needed. He was more concerned with finding his way through the southern swamp without a map.

Everything Link knew about Termina he learned from Dark—who wasn’t exactly a world-class tour guide. The south, it seemed was largely covered in forest, much like Hyrule. The swamp Tatl talked about covered a huge area just south of town.

Tatl’s stream of worry was cut off abruptly, and Link stopped to see she was hovering at the base of a large tree. 

“What’s this?” Link asked, kneeling down to see the pictures scratched into its bark. Someone had carved the image of a boy and with two fairies. “Skullkid?”

“Tael and I met him during a thunderstorm a few months ago. He was all by himself, which is strange for a skullkid. Usually they band together, you know?”

Link knew. The skullkids in the Lost Woods played together, playing games and chasing each other through the trees. 

“He was hiding inside a hollow log, shivering,” Tatl continued sadly. “He said he’d been fighting with his friends and they’d left him alone. But from then on, we were all friends. We spent every day together. Before the mask...” she trailed off, her wings drooping.

“It changed him?”

“He was always playing tricks on people before,” Tatl said. “But then he found that mask.”

Link traced the grooves in the bark. He’d etched his own drawings, back at his treehouse in the Kokiri Forest, of himself heroically fighting monsters. Tatl’s words recalled memories of the friends Link’d left behind in Hyrule. The friends he’d lost.

“Maybe you could turn time back,” she suggested. “Before he found the mask...I mean.”

Link stood up. “I don’t think it works like that, Tatl,” he said. “I don’t get to choose when it takes me back to. It takes us back to when we need to be, not when we want to be.”

Tatl sighed. “Well, let’s not waste these three days, okay?”

She zoomed away from the tree, zigzagging through a corridor of hanging vines. Link followed after her, heading deeper into the swamp.

***********   
_Gerudo Valley_

The Gerudo took their training seriously. Over the past two months, Dark had spent his time honing his skills both on the range and in the training grounds.

Before Nabooru’s and her captains’ regimens, Dark would have sworn he was an acceptably skilled fighter. Now he knew he could become downright lethal. 

Imara watched with a practiced eye as Dark steered his mount at full gallop through the archery range. The horse snorted, its hooves thundering into the hard-packed dirt. An arrow was already set, aimed at the first target; it rocketed home as Dark whipped past, striking the bull’s-eye. The next two targets were the same. Whirling the horse around, Dark turned his sights on the last target, sitting atop a high wooden pole.

Striking while riding was challenging, but Dark used the muscles in his legs for grip and balance, his bicep bunching as he drew back the bowstring. Steadying his breath, Dark let air fill his lungs and then slide out in a slow exhale. He let loose the last arrow, smirking in satisfaction when it found the red dot in the centre of the target.

Trotting back to Imara, he swung down with a grin.

“Did I pass?”

The Gerudo captain eyed him. “Still a bit slow,” she told him. “But acceptable.”

Dark patted the horse’s sweating neck, guiding her to the nearby water trough for a drink. “Aalrian seemed to think I was improving.”

Imara smirked. “She would, wouldn’t she?”

Dark chuckled. Imara’s younger sister was closer in age to him, and she frequently volunteered to spar with him. Though those bouts usually ended with her getting the best of him.

His stay with the Gerudo wasn’t meant to last, he knew, but he found himself wishing he could stay a bit longer. Their initial wariness had faded into a warm welcome, and he felt more at home. With the Gerudo, his mixed heritage and appearance didn’t garner hatred and mistrust at the sight of him, as it did in Hyrule.

“We’re having a feast tonight,” Imara said, while the two of them retrieved the arrows from the targets.

“What’s the occasion?”

“Mistress Impa is coming to visit us.”

Dark stopped, midway through freeing another arrow. “I see.”

“Have you met her?” Imara asked off-handedly.

“A few times,” he muttered, unsaddling his mount and stacking the saddle over a fence.

Nabooru had invited her, he was sure. The Gerudo leader had mentioned that Impa was more likely to know about the evil magic that had caused Sienna and others to fall ill. As a Sheikah, Impa was the holder of a great deal of dark knowledge and abilities, though she wasn’t inclined to use them herself. As a servant of the Hyrulean king, and a surrogate mother to Princess Zelda, Impa held quite a bit of trust at court. 

Not to mention she was the Sage of Shadow, although only a few knew of it.

“Good job today,” Imara was telling him, gathering up the last of their practice weapons. “I’ll see you at the feast?”

“I’ll be there,” he agreed, watching Imara walk off, his mount’s reins in one hand and te weapons under the other arm.

Imara didn’t recall anything from the time forgot. Their relationship now was leagues better than it had been, as they were now on the same side. Dark thought it must be better for the Gerudo that they forgot the years under Ganondorf. If only he had the luxury of forgetting. There were some memories he would have loved to purge from his mind.

Unbidden, the flash of Sienna’s wide-eyed, tear-stained face appeared. Dark smashed his eyes shut, but the memory replayed, uncaring. He saw Alatar’s wicked blade slide across her throat. He saw the slow slide of her body to the floor. The vanishing of the light and brilliance in her eyes.

He stumbled on his way back to the fortress, taking the steep slope back into the valley. Rubbing his fist across his forehead, Dark nodded halfheartedly to the guards he passed. He intended to head back to his rooms for a shower and change before the party, but a Gerudo girl dressed in a sleeveless white shirt and matching pants approached him, one of Nabooru’s attendants.

“The exalted Nabooru has requested your presence,” she told him, bowing her head.

Dark sighed, thanked her and changed direction. Nabooru’s room was in the deepest part of the fortress, well hidden from her enemies. After Ganondorf’s execution and Nabooru’s rise to power, not all the Gerudo had been overjoyed. And some of the marauding tribes that shared the desert with the all-female clan hadn’t been pleased with the shift in authority.

Approaching her rooms, Dark waited for her guards to announce him and Nabooru to allow him entrance before pushing aside the long cloth hanging over the doorway. Impa and Nabooru sat on large, plush cushions inside, waiting for him. Nabooru smiled at him, noting his dusty disarray. Impa fixed him with sharp crimson eyes over the rim of her goblet.

“Training?” Nabooru asked, not waiting for an answer as he sat and took the cup she offered him. “Hopefully the feast tonight will cheer you up.”

“Impa,” Dark greeted her. “How’s Link?”

A hint of a smile flashed on the Sheikah’s face. “Troublesome, which won’t surprise you. But otherwise well.”

She turned their host. “I apologize for not arriving sooner, but I haven’t been able to leave my duties in Hyrule. And I needed to conduct some research.”

Nabooru waved off her concern just as Dark asked what kind of research Impa had been doing.

“You’re here now,” Nabooru said, “So perhaps you’d like to tell Dark what you found?”

He waited impatiently while Impa sipped from her drink. She put it down, turning her direct gaze on him.

“Nabooru has told me some of what you told her about Sienna,” Impa began.

Dark shot the redhaired woman an annoyed look, which she shrugged at.

“As you know, I also witnessed the effects of this mysterious plague when the king and others in the kingdom fell ill,” Impa continued. “I have not yet discovered its cause, but it seems to have disappeared on its own. Whatever it is, it’s no natural sickness.”

“I figured,” he grumbled.

“My efforts into researching it have met a frustrating dead end,” she told him, “But as for your other request … I can help you.”

Dark sat up straighter. “You know a way to contact the dead?”

“Contacting the dead is simple,” Impa replied. “Reaching Sienna’s spirit may prove difficult.” At his confused look, she explained. “Sienna was killed by dark magic in the other time. Then she was taken again by this cursed sickness. I tried to contact her spirit myself when Nabooru reached out to me weeks ago, but I wasn’t able to.”

Dark blinked. “So...what happened to her? Where is she?”

Impa’s eyes clouded with what might have been sympathy. Dark tensed.

“I’m afraid, like many other spirits afflicted with such magic, she is in the Dark World.”

The blood froze in Dark’s veins, chilling him inside out. “What does that mean?”

Impa held her hand in front of her face horizontally, palm down. “Imagine this is the Sacred Realm,” she said, “And here is our world.” Her other hand she held up vertically below the first. “Between the two is an invisible thread connecting them through time and history. The key to this passage from one plane to the other is the Master Sword.”

Dark frowned. “I’m confused. Is the Master Sword a sword or a key?”

“It can be two things, Dark,” Nabooru said, snorting.

“The Master Sword,” Impa continued firmly, ignoring him, “serves a dual purpose.” She moved her upper hand and pressed it against the lower one’s palm. “The realm of Shadow, as you know, Dark, exists directly beside our world of Light. The two are fused together and cooperate as two sides of one.”

“Okay...And the Dark World?”

Impa lowered her hands. “It is connected to our world, as the Sacred Realm is. Though it was created by forces of darkness, and not born of the gods. The Dark World is less concrete than you might think. It encompasses multiple planes of existence. Some planes of the Dark World are indeed dangerous and monstrous.”

“If Sienna is trapped there, she could be in danger, then,” Dark said, scowling. “Hence my urgency.”

“It’s just her spirit, Dark,” Nabooru said gently. “Nothing can physically harm her.”

Dark glared at her. “Whether she’s a spirit or not doesn’t matter. She doesn’t deserve to be there alone for eternity.”

“She won’t be,” Impa assured him. “Eventually, she will come to terms with her death.”

“How can she when I’m the one responsible for it?!”

The two Sages exchanged a look. Dark’s teeth ground together.

“Is there a way to get to the Dark World?” he asked. “A link between the worlds? A sword-key or something?”

Impa glanced at Nabooru. “There are no passages that I know of right now,” she replied. “Sometimes they are temporary.”

Nabooru shrugged. “The last portal we had was destroyed for everyone’s safety after Ganondorf’s execution.”

Dark growled in frustration. “Of course, it was.”

She lifted her shoulder again. “Just telling you like it is.”

Gritting his teeth in irritation, he asked, “Will it be possible to reach her? Even without a portal?”

“It should be,” Impa replied unhelpfully. “A partial connection, at least. You’ll be able to speak with her,” she added when Dark shot her a glare.

“We’ll need to make the trek to the Spirit Temple to do it,” Nabooru remarked. “I can make arrangements, but we won’t be able to leave until the day after tomorrow.”

Impa nodded. “I can come with you. If I am needed urgently at the castle, I can leave at a moment’s notice.”

Like the other Sages, Impa could warp in an instant, anywhere in the world she wanted to go. An ability Dark sorely wished he had. It could be learned, if one’s magic was strong enough.

“Perfect,” Nabooru said. “Then, Dark I suggest you take a shower.” She dusted the dirt from his shoulder with a grin. “Want to look nice, now don’t we?”

Rolling his eyes, he said, “Nayru strike me down if I don’t clean up before the festivities.”

He rose from the cushion, nodding farewell to the two women. As he drew back the cloth, Nabooru called after him.

“Nayru appreciates good presentation! And so do my girls!”

Two hours later, Dark was as presentable as he thought he could be. He was showered, he’d shaved, tied back his long hair and put on the frankly ridiculous Gerudo clothes that had been left out for him. Nabooru and the Goddess of Wisdom would have to be satisfied with his efforts.

Long, loose-fitting trousers came with only a pair of short, Gerudo boots and two leather arm bands. On top of that insufficient pile of clothes he’d found a broad, gold necklace, belt, and earrings to complete the ensemble.

During the day the desert was scorching, but at night he would surely freeze without a shirt. Luckily, Nabooru’s celebratory feast included hot food and large bonfires.

The fortress’s central area had been cleared of the mobile guard towers and stations, allowing room for half a dozen enormous fire pits. Around each was a crowd of Gerudo, dancing, socializing and making merry.

Behind the largest pit, over which a fat boar was roasting, sat Nabooru, Impa, Imara and the other high-ranking captains. As was Gerudo custom, Dark made his way to the queen first, bowing in greeting.

“I knew navy was your colour,” Nabooru teased him. “Like the clothes?”

Dark kept his expression neutral as he straightened, but she wasn’t fooled. Her topaz eyes sparkled with amusement. Standing from her cushions, Nabooru grabbed a platter a serving girl offered her and passed it to Dark.

“Enjoy yourself, Dark. Eat, drink. The night is young and our quest doesn’t start until tomorrow. Take some of those troubles off your mind.”

She patted him on the shoulder, her expression morphing from amusement to a wrinkle of concern across her brow. Dark let out a breath, trying to take her advice and let out some of the tension.

“At least you know how to throw a party,” he told her.

She winked, her smile returning. “You haven’t seen anything yet.” She left to stand in front of the crowd, lifting her cup and calling out a greeting to her assembled people.

As a guest, Dark was given a seat at Nabooru’s bonfire, to the left of Aalriann, who sat behind her older sister, Imara. The younger girl smiled at him as he sat, digging into the plate of food.

“Is it true you’re friend with Mistress Impa?” she asked, glancing at the Sheikah woman, busy watching Nabooru’s speech. 

“I wouldn’t say friends exactly,” Dark answered, seeing the curiosity and slight awe in Aalriann’s gaze. “We’re…friendly. On friendly terms, that is.”

“Such intriguing friends you have, Dark,” she said, bumping her shoulder against his.

He smiled back. Nabooru’s speech finished with an answering chorus of whoops from the Gerudo, the boar was lifted off the fire and platters of food and jugs of ale were passed around from bonfire to bonfire. 

As dinner waned, the drinks became more plentiful, with more casks being opened on Nabooru’s request. Gerudo dancers filled the space between the fires, their clothing even less revealing than Dark’s and featuring every colour imaginable. As they danced in the firelight, their jewels sparkling, skin glowing, the music increased in tempo, until each dancer moved with such speed, they became a bouquet of coloured blurs.

Aalriann leaned over. “Do you know how to dance?”

Dark nearly choked on his sip of ale. “Not like that.”

Laughing, she stood up, offering her hands to him. “I’ll teach you.”

Dark placed his hands in hers. The gold bracelets stacked on her arms jangled together as she hauled him to his feet. Aalriann led him to the outskirts of the dancing group, showing him the steps—much slower, thankfully—to the traditional dance.

Dark luckily didn’t make a fool of himself and followed her lead. Like the others, she wore a halter top that bared her midriff and shoulders, decorated with a gold and ruby clasp at her throat. She wore a matching red skirt with more bangles on it to complement the dance, and no shoes. 

As they danced circles around one another, her smile grew, and her joy was infectious. Just as when they sparred together, Dark found himself anticipating her next move, watching for cues, mimicking her steps in the sand. They drew close at the end of the dance, palms touching, both grinning and panting slightly from the exertion.

“You’re not a bad dancer!” she said, giggling at his affronted expression.

“Why did you think I would be?”

Aalriann shrugged. “I have heard that Hylian dances are quite stiff and formal.”

“I wouldn’t know,” he answered. “I never spent much time at formal balls, though I did have to learn to dance, to my great annoyance.”

Aalriann laughed. “I had to learn to de-needle a cactus by hand, to teach me to have nimble fingers,” she told him, wiggling her digits. “I hated it.”

He laughed through his nose. “Sounds painful.” He picked up her hand as if to inspect it, running his fingertips over the pads of her. “But I don’t see any needle marks.”

Aalriann blushed, tugging her hand from his grip. “I had a good teacher,” she said. “My sister.”

As if summoned, Imara appeared at their shoulders. From her expression, Dark couldn’t tell what she was feeling.

“Dark, Nabooru would like a word.”

Thankful for an escape from what was sure to be an awkward conversation, Dark joined Nabooru and Impa at the big bonfire. The three of them talked for a few minutes to finalize their plans for the morning and their intended trip to the desert. From the corner of his eye, Dark kept part of his attention on Aalriann and her sister, who spoke briefly before Imara turned and went inside the fortress. He hoped he hadn’t landed Aalriann in trouble with her sister.

But she wasn’t trouble when Dark finished his conversation and she came to offer another dance, nor the rest of the evening as they sat and talked. As the festivities died down, Aalriann quieted a bit as they wandered through the fortress’s corridors.

Deciding to break the silence, Dark asked, “Imara isn’t angry with you for dancing with me, is she?”

Her head lifted in surprise. “No, of course not.” She frowned, her golden-brown eyes clouding. “She was just giving me some sisterly advice.”

He decided not to ask. A few strides later, they reached Aalriann’s door.

“You’re leaving for the desert tomorrow, right?” she asked.

“Yes. We should be back in a day or so.”

“So you’re staying in Gerudo Valley a while longer?”

Dark scuffed the toe of his boot against the floor. “I guess so. It depends on what we find.”

Aalriann’s gaze traced over his face. “I hope you stay a bit,” she told him, a small smile dancing around her mouth. “But if you need to leave, I understand. Imara told me you have things you need to do.”

Dark didn’t know how to answer her. He could read the cautious hope in her eyes, the inner struggle with herself. “I do,” he said.

She nodded. “Then I’ll wish you good luck.” She cupped his cheek with one hand.

Aalriann kissed him, standing on her toes to reach him. Dark let his left hand drift across her cheek to tangle in her long, red hair. The kiss was sweet but short, and too soon she released him, backing into the room, peering at him around the door, her golden eyes warm.

“I hope I see you again,” she murmured, closing the door behind her.

Dark touched his fingertips to his lips, a moment of bliss struck by a stab of guilt. Aalriann was sweet and kind-hearted; he liked her a great deal. But she was right; he wasn’t staying.

Not to mention he was technically seven years older than she was, and she suddenly seemed uncomfortably young. The kiss had reminded him so strongly of his first kiss with Sienna, seemingly a lifetime ago now. Another twinge of guilt twisted his stomach. Aalriann deserved someone who wasn’t still mending a broken heart.

Dark turned from her door, marching himself back through the fortress until he reached the guest bedroom where he stayed. Though it was late, and he had an early morning, he made himself pack his rucksack with everything he’d need before retiring. Tomorrow, he hoped to find some answers.

Tomorrow couldn’t come soon enough.

**********

With a clatter the wooden mask dropped at Link’s feet, the sneering face of Odolwa frozen on it.

Tatl prodded the mask curiously. She gawked at Link. “Seriously, have you done this before?”

Link sheathed his sword and bent to pick up Odolwa’s mask, a wooden face painted with bright slashes of colour. The ancient warrior’s spirit it contained was now sealed inside of, just like the Deku mask. It would bring no more harm to Woodfall swamp or its inhabitants. 

Though Link was once again in the guise of a boy, he still remembered all he’d learned in his travels through Hyrule, all the lessons he’d been taught on how to fight. Quashing the flood of memories, Link tucked the cursed mask into his pack, swapping it with the Deku mask.

Donning the mask, Link waited for the jolt of pain from the malevolent magic to pass. Now he was a deku again, Link and Tatl searched the perimeter of the room for a way back out.

Odolwa’s influence had turned Woodfall’s waters poisonous, making treacherous for its many inhabitants, both human and creature. Link and Tatl had traced the source of the poison to a place the local Deku colony revered—an enormous, ancient hollowed out tree in the centre of the swamp.

Once inside, they’d come face to face with Odolwa, the magical tree trapping them inside. With the sinister presence gone, the thick roots of the tree pulled back, revealing a second room through a veil of twisting vines.

“Princess?” Link called, Tatl hovering at his shoulder.

Inside, a deku scrub with a sweeping braid of vine and leaves turned with a huff.

“Who are you?” she asked in a high, squeaking voice—even higher and squeakier than other dekus Link had heard.

“Are you the Deku princess?”

She huffed again, shaking the skirt of the flower-petal dress she wore. “Of course I am! Who are you two?!”

“Your father sent us here to rescue you,” Tatl jumped in. 

“Rescue me!?” the princess interrupted, her eyes narrowing. “I came here to fix the source of the poisoned water! I certainly don’t need to be rescued.”

“I think the vicious warrior spirit we just beat would beg to differ,” Tatl muttered caustically.

“We need to take you back to your father,” Link explained. “If we don’t, he’s going to execute your monkey friend for kidnapping you.”

The deku princess squawked. “What!? We need to go, now!”

In a flutter of flora the princess flounced out of the room, the interior walls of the tree creaking open to clear her a path to the exit. Link and Tatl hurried after her. For a diminutive deku, she moved quickly.

With the poisoned water receding, it was easier for the three of them to cross the swamp back to the Deku colony’s palace, an elaborate wooden fort that floated in the shallow waters.

When he’d arrived yesterday, Link, in his deku disguise, had met the Deku king of the Woodfall colony and discovered that a monkey, of all things, was being blamed for the poisoned water and the king’s missing daughter. With his mask on, Link was able to converse with the monkey, who’d told him where the princess had really gone.

At the princess’s furious approach, the deku scrub guards perked up, squabbling excitedly.

“Princess!”

“You’re back!”

“Get out of my way!” she roared, the command no less forceful in her high-pitched voice.

She stormed past the dumbfounded guards, Link and Tatl on her tail, and burst into the king’s chamber. Dozens of dekus were gathered around a huge fire pit, dancing on a floor of leaves while a handful of deku pipers played for the crowd. The monkey, tied to a post, slumped miserably as he watched the festivities.

With a bellow, the deku king stopped the party, swinging to face the new arrivals.

“Daughter!”

Shrieking with overflowing fury, the deku princess launched herself at her father. Knocking him to the floor, she proceeded to stomp on the deku leader, emphasizing each punishing hit with a shouted word.

“How. Dare. You! Let. That. Monkey. Go. This. instant!”

Rounding on the guards, the princess’s small frame vibrated with anger. Squeaking nervously, the deku guards hurried to release the monkey from his bonds. Bounding to the princess, the monkey hugged her tightly, then wrapped his lanky arms around Link.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re welcome,” Tatl said impatiently. “You’re free, as we promised. Now tell us where to find one of the four.”

The monkey let go of Link, scratching his head. “You want to talk to the Guardians, right?”

“The Guardians?” she repeated, stunned. “Is that who Tael meant by ‘the four’?”

“Who are the Guardians?” Link asked.

Before the monkey could answer, the princess swooped in and grabbed his arm, tugging him back before the deku king, now recovered from the surprise attack.

“Father, we should throw a celebration in honour of this monkey’s bravery!” she declared.

While the deku king and his daughter argued, the deku musicians started up again, encouraging everyone to resume the festivities. Tatl snorted at the dekus’ carefree attitude.

“Guess they’re not going to give us the credit we’re due,” she remarked.

As the deku scrubs had continued their celebration, Link and Tatl tried to slink back out of the palace. Evening was falling outside, and Link wanted to make it back to Clocktown as soon as possible.

“Young man.” An older deku scrub, unusually tall with twin tufts of moss sprouting from the side of his head and a thin vine mustache, glided towards them. “May I have a moment?”

Link turned. He recognized the deku as the palace butler from his first visit. He’d been present during Link’s meeting with the deku king.

“As the king’s advisor, I would like to extend our profound thanks for saving the princess and returning Woodfall’s waters to normal.”

The deku bowed low, a gesture Link returned.

“Please follow me,” he said, straightening.

Puzzled, Link watched the deku advisor slide past him, leading him out of the Deku palace. Wading through the shallows outside the entrance, he led Link to a cave nearby.

Turning to him, the deku fixed serious eyes on him. “You may remove your mask.”

Shocked, Link reached up, taking off the Deku mask with the familiar resistance. Once gone, Link was a boy again.

“How did you know?”

“I recognize the signs of magic,” the advisor replied. He raked his gaze of Link’s green clothes with curiosity. “You’re a Kokiri?”

Link shuffled. “I used to be.”

The butler leveled him with an inscrutable look before turning and walking into the cave.

Inside the cave’s entrance was a basket woven of vines containing two lanterns and a large, stemmed flower. “Within these caverns are the catacombs,” the butler explained, “I will guide you to the place where you can converse with the Woodfall Guardian.”

Shaking the flower, the deku butler held it above his head like an umbrella, carrying one of the lanterns in his free hand. The enchanted flower began to spin, lifting and propelling the lightweight deku down into the cavern.

As the lantern’s light began to sink into the darkness, Link grabbed the second lantern and ran after him into the cave.

The air smelled of damp earth as Tatl and Link descended into the tunnels. Some were carved in stone, with strange Deku symbols graffitied on the walls, others had been hacked out of the remains of giant trees. Link pursued the deku butler as quick as he could, watching him vanish around sharp corners or fly effortlessly over flooded areas and wide chasms.

Link ran through each obstacle, keeping his eyes on the flicker of lantern light ahead. When at last the deku king’s advisor came to a halt, it was inside the base of another hollow tree, before a circular door carved in the wood and sealed tight.

“You are quite fast,” the deku complimented Link as he caught up. “Beyond this door will lead you to the Woodfall Guardian, but first, I must apologize to you.” The butler gave him a formal bow. “I was caught up in the race and did my best to outrun you.” 

His curling moustache quivered as he let out the deku version of a chuckle. “My son and I used to race each other in these tunnels, but he has gone missing. For a moment, I thought I was back here with him.”

Sympathy welled in Link. He knew the pain of a loved one vanishing without a trace. Lost in memories, the deku butler bowed his head, the glow of his orange eyes dimming.  
“What happened to him?” he asked.

The deku butler raised his head. “Some time ago, he went into the Lost Woods. He has not returned.”

Tatl flinched guiltily. Link leaned close to ask what was wrong in a whisper, when the butler turned his back to unlock the door.

“His son…” Tatl explained in a hushed voice. “Skull Kid used the spirit of a deku in the Lost Woods to turn you into one of them. I think—” She trembled with a shaky inhale. “I think his son’s spirit is inside your mask.”

Link held the Deku Mask in front of him, studying its features. The deku’s mournful eyes stared back at him.

“You may enter,” the butler told Link, stepping away from the now open door. “The Guardian will be waiting for you.”

His eyes fell on the mask Link held, some unknown emotion lighting in his gaze.

“The Skullkid turned me into a deku scrub,” Link explained, offering it to him. “But a friend healed the spirit sealed within this mask.”

The butler accepted the Deku mask with thin, twig-like fingers, his eyes drooping with sadness.

“Take it,” Link told him. “Lay your son to rest.”

Carefully, the butler cradled the wooden mask to his chest. He lifted his gaze to Link’s. A drop of dew slid from the deku butler’s eye.

“Thank you.”

Not wanting to linger while the deku butler’s grief overwhelmed him, Link and Tatl stepped towards the open door and the darkened chamber beyond. Inside was a circle of light hovering over the ground, gently pulsing with magic—a portal.

“Young man.”

Link turned back.

“When we Deku die, our spirits are not lost forever. We become a part of the forest again.” There was a heavy pause, as if he weighed his next words. “The same is true for the spirits of fairies. They can never truly die. They simply return.”

With that, the circular door rolled back into place, sealing Link within the chamber. The deku butler’s words echoed in his mind as he stepped into the circle of light.

Having traveled through many portals, Link was used to the whooshing sensation of being brought to another place. Upon opening his eyes, he thought for a brief second the magical portal led to the Chamber of Sages. Then, he realized it wasn’t.

No less open and endless, this new place stretched on into a hazy horizon. Link stood on a wide platform—the stump of a great tree, its rings too numerous to count. All around was a swirling, dancing fog that rose and fell like waves. Somewhere there was a sun shining, but it was obscured.

“Where…are we?” Tatl murmured.

A low-pitched, rumbling wailing drifted over to them. Far in the distance, a darker shape moved in the fog, slim and tall as a house. Link squinted but could not make out the figure.

The mournful wailing continued to echo, rising and dropping as if in song.

“Are you the Guardian of Woodfall?” Link called out.

His answer was more of the same wailing call.

“It’s singing,” Tatl said, awed.

The Guardian in the fog continued its song, pausing between repetitions. Link listened carefully, memorizing the notes that echoed across the valley of mist. Satisfied, the Guardian began wailing again, a slower, more staccato rhythm than before.

“It’s talking,” Tatl explained, her fairy senses allowing her to translate. “It’s saying…'Call us’.”

“Call us?” Link repeated. “The song it was singing…it must summon the four Guardians.”

“Three more left to free.”

“I’ll need to play the Song of Time again,” Link said, reaching for the ocarina. “We’ve already used up two of the three days in Woodfall.”

In the distance, the Guardian’s shadow turned, the ground vibrating with its heavy steps. It walked away; its tall shape swallowed up.

“Won’t turning back time undo everything we did?” Tatl asked.

Link lifted the instrument, hesitating. “I’m not sure. But there’s only one way to find out.”

Link placed his fingertips on the ocarina’s smooth surface, allowing the familiar notes of the Song of Time to flow from it.

He and Tatl were soon swept up in a current of magical energy. In a blink, the misty valley of the Guardian’s chamber vanished in a flash of light.

**********

The desert wind bit at Dark’s exposed skin, a thousand tiny needles pelting him. Even on a good day, it was a treacherous place.

Ahead of him, Nabooru’s tall frame, draped in a cloak, trudged on. With her to guide them, they didn’t need the resident spirit guide. On foot, the journey was slow. The second day of their journey was ending, and he wished they could hurry.

He didn’t want to spend another night in the desert.

“Almost there!” Nabooru shouted above the wind, and Dark breathed a sigh of relief.

Last night he’d been unable to sleep. The Haunted Wasteland had earned its name, tormenting him with visions of Sienna.

To make matters worse, his shadow, Kai, was glued to his side. Unaffected by the desert wind, his unseen double was strangely silent. At least he kept the other hallucinations at bay.

An hour later, when the winds quieted and the shape of the Colossus was in sight, Kai finally spoke.

“Are you sure?” he asked Dark, his semi-transparent gaze narrowing.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” he muttered, low so Nabooru or Impa didn’t overhear. They couldn’t see Kai, but they might frown at him talking to himself like a lunatic.

“You might not hear what you want to.”

With that warning, Kai vanished once more. Uneasy, Dark followed the two Sages to the desert temple’s entrance. 

Inside was both familiar and new. The sandstone walls and dim interior brought back memories of his first visit to the temple with Link and Zelda. A lifetime ago. A time that never happened.

Unlike the last time, their path wasn’t blocked, and Nabooru led Impa and Dark into the enormous statue chamber. Lighting the torches near the altar, Nabooru filled all but the deepest shadows with warm light. Shadows flickered on the walls, carved with centuries of Gerudo stories.

“This should be an ideal place, spiritually speaking,” Nabooru said. “And with Impa here, I’m hoping the two of us can reach through to the Dark World.”

“The ritual is simple, but taxing,” Impa said to Dark. “Are you ready?”

He nodded, only a little surprised when Nabooru instructed him to strip to the waist and handed him a Gerudo dagger. He knew they saw the large, jagged scar splashed across his chest, but Nabooru only winced sympathetically and Impa didn’t comment. The mark had faded a bit, but he imagined he could still feel the cold slide of Alatar’s dagger where it had split his skin over and over.

Sitting cross-legged on the altar, Dark waited for Impa and Nabooru to take their positions to his southwest and southeast, the three of them forming a triangle. Power began to pour off the two Sages as they accessed their respective elements.

Impa, her eyes closed, started to instruct him on the required spell. Once done she began speaking low in Sheikah, uttering the required words to open a link to the Dark World. Nabooru used her power to call out to Sienna’s spirit.

Magic cocooned them, deepening the spell, piercing between the veil separating them from the Dark World. At Nabooru’s instruction, Dark raised the dagger and sliced a thin line across his forearm. His blood pearled on his skin, throbbing with the hum of magic in the air.

The energy in his blood mingled with the spell’s power, gaining focus, responding to his call. The walls of the temple melted away, leaving him alone in complete darkness.  
Memories of Sienna flooded him, each one appearing as an incandescent thread, creating a web of light around him.

“I can see her,” Nabooru grunted. “Stay focused, Dark.”

Mentally tugging on each string of light, Dark searched for the strongest one, imagining it reeling him closer to Sienna’s presence, barely brushing his consciousness. A second presence prodded him, diverting his attention. A string of light, deep blue instead of lavender, like Sienna’s, trailed off from Dark, snaking off into darkness.

The connection shone feebly, calling to him. Without warning, the cage of light around him disappeared, and Alatar appeared before him, wielding that same knife, glinting like onyx. 

“No!” Dark shouted in the blackness, reaching for the memories, those trails of light, but there was no answer.

Something flashed, and Dark raised his arms to block the swing of the dagger. But it cut straight through him, ripping into his chest without mercy. Dark screamed. Alatar’s horrible laughter speared him. The darkness enclosed on him, swallowing him.

The spell broke like a thunderclap, snapping them all free of the connection and hurtling them back into reality. Dark, his heart hammering, crouched on the altar, his arms extended defensively.

Reflexively, he reached up to touch the mark on his chest, relieved to feel there was nothing there but scarred skin. Dazed, Nabooru and Impa sat up from where the spell breaking had thrown them backwards.

“It’s still in me,” Dark panted. “Alatar’s curse is still there. It’s coming back.”

Impa reached forward and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Dark –”

He jerked away. “Don’t.”

“It can’t return if you don’t allow it, Dark,” Impa said gently. “You are stronger than he is.”

He shot up from the altar, snatching his shirt and pulling it back on.

“Where are you going?” Nabooru asked. “We can try again. We started to make contact!”

“No,” Dark growled. “I’m not going back in. If I do, Alatar will take control of me again.”

He shoved the dagger back in Nabooru’s hands. She and Impa watched him pace back for a few moments before Impa spoke up.

“I will keep trying to reach Sienna, but Dark, you must forgive the guilt you feel over her death. If you do not, Alatar’s curse will be nothing compared to the chains you place on yourself.”

Her gaze was steady, boring into his. Denial surged in him, and he tore his eyes away from hers. How could he forgive himself? He didn’t deserve forgiveness. What he needed to do was help free Sienna from this fate. He couldn’t fail her again.

“I’ll find another way into the Dark World,” he said at last. “There has to be another portal somewhere. And I will find it.”

Nabooru and Impa said nothing as he left the altar room. He sensed their eyes on his back but didn’t slow or turn around. 

He couldn’t open his mind to influences of the Dark World or the spirits. It was too risky. He would find another way in. Another way to rescue Sienna. Stalking down the sandstone passageway, Dark was already planning where to search for clues, the torches on the wall flickering brightly as he passed.


	3. Mountain

_Southern Hyrule, town of Cartheiron_

The Three Sails Inn, it was named, or so proclaimed the wooden sign hanging above it, hanging on by a single rusty nail. It was a beaten-down old building, not much to look at. The roof sagged like an old woman’s back, and several of the windows had been boarded up with driftwood against the strong coastal winds. The wind sailed right through it, creating a great howling, moaning sound as it rattled the window shutters with their missing wooden slats here and there. 

The structure was crunched between an equally sad-looking bar and the town post office. The glass was missing from the post office’s windows, and a shady character lounged outside the bar, his hood raised to hide his face. 

Dark faced the inn with no shortness of trepidation. As far as towns went, Cartheiron was an unwelcome one. He’d nearly been robbed twice already.

He let out a sigh. It was late, and he didn’t like his options. It was either the run-down inn, or another long night of traveling alone in the dark. He could always camp out somewhere on the beach, but it was too exposed. He gritted his teeth. At least it would be a roof over his head. 

He reached for the worn handle of the inn door. The hooded man watched him from the corner of his eyes. Dark ignored the man, stepping out of the fiercely blowing wind.   
The inside of the shabby inn wasn’t much warmer. It consisted of what looked like two rooms on the first level; the lobby and the kitchen. There was light coming from the kitchen. Whoever was there heard his footsteps as he approached the front desk. It sagged in the middle like a “U,” the wooden surface old and weak. Other than the desk, the room was barren. 

A stocky man with dark hair and a beard emerged from the kitchen. He set down the candlestick he was carrying, watching his late-night patron with distrust in his eyes. 

“Yeah?” the man asked, reaching below the sagging part of the desk for something. He pulled out a large, dusty old book. He flipped it open and took out a charcoal pencil, placing it on the page.

“How much is a single room for the night?” Dark asked. The bearded man was squinting at him, trying to see under the hood that covered his eyes.

“Twenty rupees,” the owner replied, shoving the old book towards him.

He didn’t comment on the price. Even five rupees was steep for this shoddy place. Without a word he dropped the money on the counter, then picked up the charcoal pencil, raising it in his left hand. He hesitated just a moment, deciding it might be best not to use his real name. He scratched four letters carefully onto a free line. The paper was so dusty and fragile he was afraid he would rip it just by writing on it.

The owner seized back his book, flipping it around to read the name. He chuckled as he reached under the desk once again. The innkeeper slapped a room key onto the desk, marked with the number 6, instructing him that his room would be located up the stairs in the kitchen at the far end of the hall. Dark nodded, taking the key and stowing it inside his cloak.

“Northerner, huh?” the man asked, squinting suspiciously at him again.

Dark turned his head towards the man, feeling an uncomfortable tickle crawling up his spine. The man’s accent was markedly different than his own. Still, he hadn’t expected him to place a northern Hyrule accent so quickly. 

“Your accent,” the man explained. “You might want to watch that, ‘specially ‘round here.”

Dark remained silent, nodding in thanks before turning towards the kitchen. He found the staircase easily enough; a narrow passage that was more slide than stairs leading up to the second floor. He opened door number 6, locking it behind him. The wind howled through this room, too. 

There was a cold, empty fireplace in the corner. A stack of dusty driftwood sat next to it. He sat on the bed, which creaked beneath his weight, sinking several inches closer to the floor. He tucked the key safely under the pillow, removing his cloak and placing it over the bedspread like a blanket. He then removed his boots, freeing his aching feet.

A lone, unlit candle stood on the rickety nightstand next to him. Dark reached over and ran a fingertip over the wick. A spark popped from his skin, lighting the wick and giving a small amount of light to the dreary room. It didn’t lend any warmth, but the flame was comforting. He huddled closer to it, lazily swinging his fingertip back and forth through the candle flame.

After several minutes, he lay back on the bed, ignoring the creaking sounds. The cloak he pulled over top of him as a surrogate blanket. He turned his head to stare at the candle flame again. As exhausted as he was from the day’s travels, he couldn’t sleep. His eyes remained wide open rather than drifting slowly closed. His mind continued to work and his body stayed rigid and alert instead of becoming heavy with sleep. 

He lost track of time, just staring at the small flame. Eventually, a strong gust of wind forced its way past the windowpanes and into the room. It easily snuffed out the flame, bringing darkness back into the room.

Sometime after that, he fell asleep, and began to dream.

_The room was silent. The kind of dread, eerie silence that hung in the air—a palpable feeling of unease. He’d been here before. He kept revisiting it. He was sitting in the same chair next to her bed._

Stand, _he thought._ Stand, damn it. Get out of here. Just leave.

_He couldn’t. He never could. All he could do was sit there and watch. Sit there and hold her hand in his. And every time, he felt helpless. It was torture, reliving this over and over. Why wouldn’t it stop? What was he supposed to learn from watching this over and over again?_

_She coughed, as always, raising her head to look at him. Her vision was out of focus, her eyes glassy. Her hand was freezing; he could feel it, even in the dream. He wasn’t sure if she recognized him, but she always looked at him. Like she was trying to tell him something._

_His heartbeat sped up. He knew what was coming. Just pull your hand away, he commanded his brain, hating himself for even thinking about it. But he couldn’t stand it. It was too late; her fingers clawed into his palm, gripping him tightly. Her unfocused eyes rolled back in her head and she went rigid. He panicked, his hands reaching for her shoulders. He knew he was shouting, but he couldn’t remember what._

_Her hands started to relax, the fingers curling in towards her palms. Her eyes fluttered, the hazy look in them fading to something much worse. He continued to try and revive her, continued to scream her name. It was useless. He wished he could make himself stop, knowing already that she was gone. Her eyes were empty._

_The scene inside the bedroom was dissolving, being replaced by a new image. He thrashed, helpless against the confines of his mind, desperately trying to wake himself up. If there was anything worse than reliving her death, it was this._

_Her terrified face appeared before him, tears carving trails down her dirty face. Her lips trembled, whispering indistinct words. Her gaze never left his, her expression pleading. The screaming started in his head. He fought against it, but it won. The dark, impenetrable fog descended on his consciousness and took over. Her eyes widened, seeing the change. Her whispered words became more fervent._

_Wake up, wake up, wake up!_

_His vision went from black to red. A thick spray of something hit his neck and chest and his eyes instinctively closed._

_Wake UP!_

Something cold and wet splashed against his face. He bolted upright, one hand rising to wipe his face. 

“Get it off, get it off…” he muttered, his fingers working furiously to clean his face and neck.

Dark halted when he realized he was awake. He was shaking. The cloak lay on the floor where he had thrown it during his sleep. He sucked in a shuddering breath, cursing as he exhaled. Retrieving the makeshift blanket, he checked his hand. Relief nudged him when he realized the liquid that had hit him in the face was rainwater. It continued to drop down on his head; the roof was leaking. 

He leaned forward, resting his forehead on his knees as he raised them up. He kept his eyes open, afraid of what he might see if he closed them. 

It’d been two years, and still the nightmares haunted him at night. The memories found him during the day, triggered by the smallest things. He would wake up, swearing he could smell her sweet lavender scent. He would reach out for her, finding only emptiness. He would pass by a familiar tree, or shrub or flower, and wait for her voice to tell him its name, use and significance. Her voice never came. A pretty girl would pass by, and his breath would catch, thinking it was her face he had seen. Then he would look again and meet the eyes of a stranger. 

He groaned, digging his fingers into his scalp. He’d left Gerudo Fortress weeks ago, traveling through the desert and then the plains of the south. Trying to outrun it all. In Cartheiron, he’d reached the coast. There was nowhere else to go. There was nothing but ocean. Maybe he could just drown himself and be done with it.

Dark snorted, lifting his head. He glanced towards the blackened candle wick again. He coaxed the flame back to life, shifting to sit on the edge of the bed.

He wasn’t much for religion, but asking for guidance from the gods didn’t seem like such a hard thing at the moment. Reaching out, he tried to open his spirit to the goddess of power, Din. Fire was also one of the goddess’s elements. He was surrounded by wind and water. The furthest he could get from his element. He stared into the flame. He prayed that Din would come through for him. 

He muttered a simple prayer, holding the image of the flame in his mind’s eye. He was out of practice, but he hoped it worked. The wonderful thing about fire was that it could be created even in the worst of places. Could be called forth to light up the darkest night.

Dark laid back on the bed. The tired moaning of the house as it was assaulted by wind and rain, the drooping mattress and less than desirable pillow suddenly didn’t bother him so much. 

He drifted off to sleep again, his rest undisturbed by the haunting memories of her. The candle continued to burn next to his head as he slept, a solitary source of warmth and light in the dark quiet. A small reassurance in a cold and unfriendly place. 

**********   
_Termina, many years ago_

Winter’s icy clutches were loath to let go of the Snowhead mountains. Spring should have arrived weeks ago, yet there were no green sprouts underneath the blanket of white.  
The cold penetrated even the thick coat Link had brought with him, making his teeth chatter constantly. Tatl had been huddled in his hood for the last hour of their hike north, shivering so violently Link was worried the little fairy would explode.

Wolfos and other unfriendly beasts stalked Link through the snowy landscape. The exertion of fighting warmed him, at least, though his fingers were beginning to feel numb from the cold. This chill couldn’t be natural.

All of Link’s instincts were screaming at him that the malevolent energy he’d felt in Woodfall was also present here. And all over Termina.

“Almost there.” He shuddered. He wasn’t sure if Tatl told him.

The only other time he’d visited Snowhead had been with Dark—even then hadn’t been so unbelievably cold. From Dark, he knew where the cabin was located. After passing it an hour ago, the temperatures had plunged even further, but Link pressed on.

They needed to reach the Goron village up ahead.

Howling wind swept through the pass, sweeping up flurries of snow. Tiny shards of ice hit his face like thousands of needles, stinging with cold. 

Through the haze of the blizzard, half-blind as he was, he almost didn’t see the greyish form of a goron hovering at the edge of a frozen pond. Stomping through the drifts, Link called out, but the goron didn’t answer or turn around.

Coming to stand next to him, Link reached out a hand to the goron’s shoulder. His hand passed right through.

A chill that had nothing to do with the blizzard doused Link.

The ghost turned charcoal eyes on Link. His body was transparent, but a darker slash across his stomach stood out. With surprise, the goron’s gaze raked over Link.

“You...can see me?”

Stunned, Link nodded back. Tatl poked her head out of the hood of Link’s coat, intrigued.

“What happened to you?” he asked, looking at the awful wound on his abdomen.

The ghost dropped its head sadly. “I am Darmani the Third, a great hero of the gorons. I went to Snowhead peak to find the source of this never-ending blizzard.” The goron glanced up at the sky. “But I was blown off the cliffside into the valley...and now I can only watch as my village is slowly buried in eternal winter, knowing I failed my people.”

Darmani hung his broad head in shame, his dark eyes cloudy with sadness. He had no physical body, but his image shimmered in and out of visibility as his form trembled.

“Whatever is causing this endless winter must be stopped,” the goron said.

“Maybe I can help,” Link offered. Darmani lifted his head in surprise. “I’m looking for the Guardian of Snowhead,” he went on.

“If you want to speak to the Guardian, you’ll need to make the journey to the peak,” Darmani cut in. He eyed Link skeptically. “It is a treacherous journey, especially now, even for a goron.”

“Normally I would agree that Link doesn’t look capable of it,” Tatl remarked, ignoring Link’s glare. “But he continues to surprise me with his survivability.”

“Thanks,” he muttered sarcastically, turning back to Darmani. “If you can guide us to the peak, I’ll try and find out what’s happening at Snowhead and fix this blizzard. Then I can speak to the Guardian.”

Darmani’s charcoal eyes blinked slowly. “You would truly help me?” he asked. 

Link nodded. Tatl’s expression told him she wasn’t overly confident in their odds of survival, but she knew the importance of speaking to the Snowhead Guardian as well as he. If they fostered some goodwill among the goron tribe in the process, it could only help their mission.

“Then I will guide you to Snowhead’s peak,” Darmani said, his hazy form swooping around Link in a circle. “Follow me!”

The ghost flew off, charging through the driving snow. Link secured the hood of his coat with Tatl hiding safely inside, then stomped through the climbing snow drifts after Darmani’s wispy shadow in the distance. Out of habit, Link gripped the hilt of his sword, readying himself for the next battle.

Who knew what awaited him at the mountain’s peak?

**********   
_Hyrule coast_

The southern sea was a locale few people from the north of Hyrule ever visited. For one, it was a great distance away. For another, the entire area was known to have a reputation.  
Aside from the distinctly criminal reputations of towns like Cartheiron, the Southern Sea was the setting of many myths and stories, good and bad.

As a Hylian, Dark had a healthy respect for magic. Especially for natural magic harnessed by the land itself.

The road from Cartheiron, tucked into the southwestern border of Hyrule, eventually led to the beach, and Dark had been muddling through its sands for days. Since there were few signs of civilization, he could enjoy his solitude.

At night, with the sounds of surf and the brilliant, star-filled sky, it was peaceful. During the day’s travel, there was the shade of trees to keep him cool and a warm breeze tinged with the smell of salt.

And then the ocean, watching with invisible eyes his progress further east. The first day he’d seen the open expanse of blue, Dark had given in to the urge to dip his hands in the cool water. But he hadn’t ventured further. There was a legend that somewhere in the vast canvas of water, there was a veil separating this world from the far shore, as the Zora called it. Disappearances and strange incidents over the years had cemented the myths, and many coastal residents swore on its veracity.

After four days, Dark came to the town of Tenura, if his map was correct. Huddled up to the coast, it was at least as populous and bustling as Castle Town, but with a distinct southern flavour. The buildings and homes here were a muted rainbow of colours, with white roofs and porches wrapped around their perimeter. The people were equally diverse and friendly, as in Castle Town, coming from all backgrounds and corners of the world. No surprise there were many zora who lived here as well.

Dark wandered down streets of hard-packed earth instead of cobblestone, sampling the local dishes and admiring the merchants’ offerings. He’d stopped to listen to a group of musicians playing in the street, when he spotted a two zora women and two zora men, talking and laughing, each holding a long, flat, oblong board under their arms.  
Curious, Dark dropped a few rupees into the musicians’ hands and followed the zoras down the street. Reaching the edge of town, they trotted out to the beach, laying their boards down in the sand. 

Farther away, Dark could spot some fishermen at their boats, either coming in from the day’s catch or returning home. There was small inlet where a dock had been built alongside the fisherman’s market. Between Dark and the inlet was a small, pale blue house on stilts thrust into the sand. A set of steps led up to the front door with a painted sign on it in the shape of a fish. Next to the door was another flat board stood upright.

Dark glanced at the water’s edge, where the group of zora were already wading into the surf.

He started towards the blue house, climbing the creaky steps and hoping it wasn’t about to collapse. The board was weathered with age, but painted with vibrant zora designs of blue, green and orange. He knocked, but there was no answer from inside. Trying the knob, Dark was surprised when the door swung open. 

Inside the house was bright, thanks to an abundance of windows. Along the right hand side was row after row of the long boards, stood on end and secured by wooden pegs driven into the wall. On the left was a short wooden counter with various unfamiliar tools left haphazardly on its surface.

A shop, then, Dark surmised, looking around for the owner. Closing the door behind him, Dark walked to the counter, finding a sleeping zora sitting behind it. The zora was leaned as far back as the chair would allow, balancing on two legs, his hands stacked behind his head. 

It was difficult to tell at times if a zora was male or female, but this one had somewhat more masculine features. His upper body was visible, and as he didn’t wear a shirt, his gender was more obvious.

Not wanting to disturb the zora and curious about the boards, Dark inspected the nearest one, sliding a hand over its smooth, shiny painted surface.

“It’s for wave riding,” said a voice from behind him. 

Dark swung around, throwing up a hand to shield his eyes. The zora had come around the corner of the desk. And he was naked. And most definitely male.

He had a slim build and pale, blue-tinted skin. Like all zora, he had flatter, webbed feet and a long fin sloping from the top of his head down the back, as well as smaller fins at his hips and elbows. Around his neck was a seashell necklace, and aside from some interesting tribal-like tattoos stretching from his temples to the end of his headfin and along the sides of his calves, it was the only thing on him. Most zoras didn’t wear a lot of clothing, but the single time Dark had visited Zora’s Domain, plenty were swimming or wandering around—and didn’t have visible genitals.

Seeing Dark’s reaction, the zora looked down at himself and snorted. “Whoops.” He grabbed a pair of loose-fitting, bright green shorts from behind the counter and pulled them on. “Sorry about that. Sometimes I forget.”

Dark lowered his hand, staring at him. “Just…wasn’t expecting it.”

“Well I’m not in the water.” The zora shrugged. “Probably a bit dehydrated. I’ve been napping here all morning—it’s been slow.”

“What does dehydration have to do with it?” Dark frowned. “All the zoras I’ve ever seen have a …” he gestured vaguely at his groin. “You know.”

The skin above the zora’s eye furrowed, as if he arched a nonexistent eyebrow. Then his expression morphed into clear amusement. “Don’t you know anything about zora anatomy?” he asked, grinning.

“Clearly not,” Dark replied dryly.

The zora laughed, tossing his finned head back. “Well, then I’ll let you in on a secret. We zora are an amphibious species. We look different when we’re in the water from when we’re out.”

Dark eyed the green shorts, still in a state of mild disbelief. The zora watched him with eyes the colour of sea foam.

The zora grinned. “I can take them off again, if you want.”

Dark flushed. “That’s alright.”

Laughing, the zora clasped Dark’s forearm. “I like you, man. I’m Jeim. I’m the proud owner of this establishment.”

“Dark.”

Jeim’s gaze swept him from head to foot, a small grin playing around his mouth. “So, you’re looking for a board? You must be new to town; I don’t recognize you.”

“Just arrived,” Dark told him. “I’m from the north,” he added, hoping the residents of Tenura didn’t have anything against northerners as Cartheiron had.

“Ah,” Jeim waved a hand carelessly. “Could tell from your accent. Don’t worry,” he added when Dark grimaced. “It’s cute! Besides, here in Tenura we don’t care where you come from as long as you bring the fun, eh? And you my friend, look like a lot of fun to me.”

Jeim winked, trailing his hand flirtatiously from Dark’s shoulder down his arm. He bounded over to the wall of surf boards, sliding one from its pegs.

“This one should work for you,” Jeim said, holding it up. “Have you ever been before?”

“No,” Dark admitted.

Jeim’s green eyes widened. “Never? We need to change that right now!”

The zora bounced back behind the shop counter, retrieving an beat-up green board and tucking it under his arm. Copying the move, Dark followed him out the door and onto the beach.

The other group of zoras were still in the water, and Jeim waved an arm in greeting. While Jeim laid their boards in the shallows and re-secured the tie on his shorts, Dark watched the progress of one of the zora as he kneeled on the surfboard, paddling towards on oncoming wave.

Instead of being smashed aside by the ocean’s force, the zora stood up, angling his body and bending his knees, riding along the ridge of water with effortless grace.

“Cool, huh?” Jeim remarked, seeing Dark’s dumbfounded expression. “Come on.”

Straddling the boards, the pair of them waded out into deeper waters, letting the smaller waves roll underneath them, making them bob up and down. Jeim gave him some brief instructions, and a couple of demonstrations, and then pushed him out towards the next building wave.

Dark crouched on the board, his bare toes threatening to slide on its surface, his legs tense and his breath held as he felt the wave swoop under him. He vaulted up, spreading his arms for balance, readjusting his stance.

For a wonderful second, he looked across the water at the shimmering white beach, the colours of Tenura dotting the incline of the valley. The wave lifted him high above the surface; he felt almost weightless. Then he was flying. Dark grinned, exhilarated.

It took a second before he realized the surfboard wasn’t coming with him.

He tumbled like a stone into the water, unsure if he was upside down or right side up. When he scratched rough sand, he flipped and dug in, propelling himself back up. He breached to find Jeim laughing, bent over on his own board.

The zora wiped a tear from the corner of his eye. “Oh, man, that was funny! Not bad for your first try, though.”

Dark snorted. “I told you I’ve never done this before.”

Jeim shook his head in mock pity. “You Northerners must never get to have any fun,” he remarked.

Dark shrugged, retrieving his surfboard and swinging back on, splashing Jeim with spare droplets. “I spent most of my time living near a goron tribe,” he explained. “Up in the mountains. Even in summer, the lake water was still pretty cold.”

“Sounds exciting,” Jeim said, arching a brow. “What are you doing all the way down here?”

He considered the question, wondering how much to reveal. He was keenly aware of Jeim’s pale green eyes on him. Finally, he shrugged and answered vaguely. “Running away from everything, I guess.”

Jeim nodded, seeming to understand what he meant. He swept his arms outward, taking a deep lungful of ocean air. “No better place to do it, my friend.”

Dark looked back at the rolling blue, its waves endlessly rising and cresting in a ceaseless, steady rhythm, gently lifting his board, pushing it back towards shore.

“No, I suppose not,” he agreed.

**********

Between Link and the Snowhead mountains’ ominous peak was a vast gorge. It stretched in all directions around the jagged, spear-like mountain, as if its fellows were too afraid to be nearer.

Freezing wind howled through the valley, obscuring everything in blinding white, whipping snow into a monstrous cloud that swept over a narrow bridge of ice and rock, extending from the plateau where Link, Tatl and Darmani stood—and floated—to the peak up ahead. 

Midway up the mountain, there was a flatter, ring-like ridge, as doused in snow as the rest of it, but more easily climbable. Unfortunately, something prowled its way around the perimeter, its broad feet unhindered in the blowing drifts.

“What is that?” Link gaped at the enormous, four-legged beast.

“A mechanical monstrosity,” Darmani responded grimly. “His bellow is fiercer than this blizzard. It was his wind power that knocked me into the chasm.”

Darmani peered over the edge into the blackness below. The wind was so strong and the blizzard so intense, the bottom couldn’t be seen. Link jerked his head up from the sight when the beast on the mountain stamped its huge feet, the tremors it caused reaching them even across the icy bridge.

The beast did indeed seem to be made of metal, from the little Link could see of it. Its halting, precise movements gave it away. It resembled a draft horse, walking on four thick legs, but its head was distinctly ram-like, with an elongated chin and wide, flat nose. Two huge, curling horns protruded from its head to curve around its jaw.

“It must be Skull Kid’s magic making it sentient,” Tatl said, her teeth chattering in the cold. “Or the mask’s, I suppose...”

“He is the cause of the endless winter,” Darmani proclaimed, thumping his chest with a fist. “He must be stopped.” His features hardened. “I will not let him defeat me again.”

Link was busy mentally mapping the mountain and surrounding valley. His hopes began to shrink as he watched the wind pound away at the bridge. If a goron hero hadn’t been able to withstand the power of the blizzard and the mechanical beast, how could he?

Link glanced at the ghost, who was rambling on about his shame in failing to save his people and the stupid mistake that had led to his downfall. As a spirit, Darmani could not summon his natural strength to help Link, but perhaps he could lend it.

The Deku mask had given Link the abilities of the lost deku scrub, combining them with Link’s own skills and magic. With them, he’d been able to navigate the poisoned swamp of Woodfall with ease. 

The Happy Mask Salesman’s strange song floated back to Link in memory. He’d been able to use the song to seal the deku scrub’s restless spirit in a Mask, giving it power.

“Darmani,” Link interrupted the spectre’s wailing. “I think I have a way to beat that monster and ensure that your honour as a goron hero is restored.”

The spirit zoomed back to his side. “You can?” he asked, hope lighting in his dark, transparent eyes.

Link nodded and reached into his pocket for the ocarina. He held it out to show Darmani. “I promise you,” he said, holding the goron’s gaze. “Once he is defeated, I will tell your village everything you’ve done for them. You won’t be forgotten.”

“What are you doing?” Tatl asked in a whisper.

Link shrugged her off and began to play. The simple but powerful song growing and echoing even over the noise of the wind. Darmani’s expression relaxed, his eyes drifting half-shut. Then, they opened wide in surprise as he stared at something neither Link nor Tatl could see. His mouth opened, and he smiled broadly, ghostly tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

Lifting his arms, Darmani extended them towards unseen friends, his joyful expression fading with the rest of him until he’d gone completely.

Link lowered the ocarina, knowing he’d succeeded when he saw the round, brown mask lying in the snow at his feet.

“You did it...” Tatl breathed. “Now you can assume Darmani’s spirit.”

Link looked down at the face of the goron hero etched into the mask. Turning it, he held it up against his own face, bracing for the rush of magic. After the pain of having his own spirit subsumed under that of a goron passed, Link stretched out his limbs. He was now a stocky goron, with a near-impenetrable, rock-like body. Strength surged through his limbs, and Link flexed his fingers experimentally. Assuming a fighting stance, Link threw a couple jabs to test the strength of his new fists. When a small boulder he struck exploded into a pile of snow and pebbles, he nearly laughed out loud.

“So?” Tatl asked.

Link grinned when a gust of wind tried to shake him. He barely felt it. He turned to the bridge. This next part would be trickier.

Gorons were naturally slow-moving creatures, so many of them wound themselves into a living boulder and rolled to get around. Link would have to be a fast learner. After a few practice runs on the slopes behind him, Link faced the bridge and took a few big steps back.

Curling up, he summoned his new goron-strength and catapulted forward. As he gained speed, he felt the rocks quaking beneath him, the wind shoving and pulling. The mechanical beast, or Goht, as Tatl had discovered using her fairy magic, bellowed long and low, accepting Link’s challenge.

The beast pawed at the ground, readying an attack. Link funnelled his remaining focus into his magic, increasing his speed. Goht howled, sending a concentrated blast of wind towards Link.

“Hold on!” Tatl shouted.

Link focused on his magic. Hold on, he chanted in his mind, Keep me on the bridge. Responding to his will, his magic exploded outwards. Spikes erupted from his bulky, rock-covered hide, digging into the ice and stone, keeping Goht’s attack from throwing him off and into the chasm.

As Link continued to shoot up the bridge towards it, Goht growled, its metal limbs creaking as it stomped around. Reaching the plateau, Link rolled to a stop and uncurled, ready to let loose an attack of his own.

Goht charged past him, trying to trample Link underneath its hooves. Throwing haymaker punches, Link grinned when he dented Goht’s legs, but he moved too slowly to defend against any kicks. They sent him sprawling into the snow. Bellowing, Goht galloped away, racing along the perimeter of the ridge, each new pass summoning a bigger and bigger gust of wind, intensifying the blizzard.

Link scrambled to curl into boulder form, giving chase to the mechanical monstrosity. He caught up to Goht, using the spikes on his back to tear and shred at the beast’s defenses. But with each stride, Goht’s blizzard grew in intensity, until it was everything Link could do to keep stuck to the mountainside.

He rolled as fast as he dared, starting to slip in the snow. The gravitational force and the wind were trying to pluck him right off the mountain face. Goht’s vicious kicks whenever he approached were difficult to dodge if he didn’t see them coming, and in constant motion as he was, seeing wasn’t easy.

A well-aimed kick sent Link colliding into the side of the mountain, temporarily dazing him. Tatl circled his head frantically. 

“Link! He’s coming back around! Get up!”

The entire mountain was shaking. Tiny needles of ice stung Link’s eyes. The wind was roaring. Goht’s hooves thundered down, growing louder with his approach.  
Instead of turning to give chase, Link faced the oncoming beast, curling up and putting everything into a burst of speed that made him shoot out like a living cannonball.  
Goht rounded the next corner, not expecting a frontal attack this time. The beast stopped so suddenly it reared on its hind legs, giving Link an opening. He plowed into Goht’s back legs, smashing them apart with his spikes and throwing him off balance. With a roar, Goht toppled over the edge, plummeting into the icy crevasse.   
Link rolled to a stop on his hands and knees, panting from exertion. With a last wailing howl, the wind ceased, and the blizzard evaporated. A fresh blanket of snow dropped onto Link’s head.

“It’s stopped!” Tatl crowed. “Thank goodness! I’m so sick of the cold.”

Link sat up, grinning. “Two down,” he said to Tatl. “Two left.”

Tatl stopped her celebrating to squint at him. “You’re a lot more than you seem to be, aren’t you?” she asked him.

Link just shrugged, standing up and walking over to the spot where Goht had fallen. Buried in a snow drift near the edge was a mask made of metal, bearing the fearsome likeness of the beast he’d just defeated. He picked it up, dusting off the snow.

Under his feet, the thick layer of snow melted with magical swiftness, revealing cold, wet stone beneath. As the cold receded and the snow vanished, Link saw a carpet of green erupt from underneath the white, filling the entire valley. Before his eyes, wildflowers burst out of the earth to greet the sun, now shining in a sky of pure blue. Trees shook off the icicles clinging to their branches, and rivers of snowmelt cascaded through the valley. The curse on Snowhead was broken.

Spring had finally come.

**********

Birdsong could be heard throughout the thick, mountain forest. The size of the trees here rivaled even the oldest in Kokiri Forest back home. Though these were dark, sturdy pines and firs that towered as proudly as the mountains around them, and sheltered everything under their wide, spiny boughs.

Link walked slowly along a faint dirt path, enjoying the sights and sounds of the woods, not rushing only because he knew he would be able to reset the clock once he was finished with his task.

Spring had at last returned to the mountains, and the gorons were rejoicing. The unnatural cold and unrelenting blizzard that threatened to wipe them out was gone. Upon returning to the goron village, Link had accepted their thanks, but he’d been quick to tell the elder of Darmani’s efforts in keeping his people safe.

For the entire first night, Link had stayed with the gorons, celebrating with a traditional goron feast—with a few edible items for Link—and dance. The next day, Link had presented Darmani’s mask to the elder, so that the goron hero could at last be laid to rest. After a moment of silence, the goron elder had risen from his chair and directed Link outside the village to the woods.

The goron elder, a truly ancient and stooped being, now walked sedately beside Link, his shock of white hair obscuring his wrinkled face.

“Just a bit further,” the old goron wheezed, tapping his walking stick in the dirt.

Link looked ahead. A boulder etched with goron symbols barred the entrance to a cave in the side of a mountain. Whatever was inside must have been special to the village.  
Stopping at the entrance, the elder lifted his stick, tapping it twice in the dirt. On command, the boulder rolled aside, revealing two burly, goron guards inside.

“Elder!” the first exclaimed in surprise. “Do come in.”

They stepped aside to let Link and the elder pass into the chamber beyond. It was a huge space, lit with luminous stones the gorons had mined from the rock. In haphazard rows, slabs of rock had been placed and carefully painted with images and words. The ground, far from being chilled, emitted a pleasant warmth.

“This is the village cemetery,” the elder explained, guiding Link to the largest stone at the back of the chamber. “All of our chieftains are laid to rest here, above this natural hot spring.”

Taking Darmani’s mask, Link knelt in front of the tombstone, placing the mask at its base.

“Darmani’s name will be written here,” the elder said, nodding at the stone. Many names were inscribed on its smoothed surface, some faded with age. “His deeds will be remembered by all gorons.” The elder turned his head, his chin wobbling as he smiled. “And neither will yours, young man.”

Link stood back and joined the elder in a moment of quiet contemplation. The gorons were a simple people, but their culture was as proud as any other. In Hyrule, Link had often visited the goron tribe of Death Mountain. In their homes, on their walls, they had inscribed the history of their people, the stories, the important figures and events—everything worth remembering. The gorons had long memories and welcoming hearts. 

Even with the passing of countless ages, the loss and change and turmoil, gorons persevered. No matter their circumstances, they bonded together. No matter what was lost, it was regained in memory.

Tears pricked the backs of Link’s eyes. As a child, he’d grown up with the Kokiri in the forest. Like the gorons, they embraced a simple, happy life. The passage of time did not bother them, as it was a natural cycle, just as the cycles of life in the forest. When the people of the forest experienced loss, they were comforted by the knowledge that death was not truly an end.

Link glanced at Darmani’s likeness on the mask, its expression fierce but smiling. The memory of the Deku butler appeared, his tears falling as he remembered his beloved son.  
Believing in the cycles of life or relying on fond memories of lost loved ones did not stop the pain of grief, Link thought, swiping at his face. It didn’t dull the sharp strike of loss. But it did bring comfort. A balm to the soul. Perhaps, he thought, over time, it did lessen the pain.

Hours later, Link and Tatl had said their farewells to the Snowhead gorons and were traveling back to Clocktown.

It was already nearing the close of the second day, but Link wanted to restock their supplies before starting the three-day cycle over, and he didn’t want to give up any of that time reaching their next destination: the western sea.

Descending from the mountains, now bare of snow, was easier than hiking up had been. At some point, though, Link must have taken a wrong turn on the way back to town.  
Tatl grumpily blamed Link’s old map. Link blamed it on the unfamiliar surroundings—yesterday they had been snow-covered—the darkness of night and the sudden torrential downpour.

The heavy coat Link had brought was quickly soaked through, and his regular clothes weren’t nearly warm enough. The road was unlit and muddy, and Link felt like he was stumbling around blind. Navigating their way back to town by the stars was no longer possible, as the sky filled with bruised, black clouds.

The plains of Termina Field had no distinct landmarks either. Even the lights from the walls of Clocktown weren’t yet visible in the distance.

Link was debating camping out in a tree for the night when Tatl suddenly piped up.

“Look! There’s a light up ahead.”

Squinting, Link could just make out a flickering shine in the blackness. Someone’s home?

He rushed ahead, his boots squelching in the mud. The faint light grew and grew, eventually revealing a long, one-story house and a larger, two-story structure next to it. A wide, open yard surrounded the dwelling, circled by a simple wooden fence. Rain pounded the roof of the house, dripping off the ledge in tiny streams. Lightning split the sky, accompanied by the first rumblings of thunder.

Link lifted his fist and hammered on the door to be heard above the storm. He pushed his wet hair out of his face, pulling aside his hood and hat so Tatl could hide inside it.  
The door cracked open and a young woman peered out at him through the scant space.

“Who are you?” she asked, her lips thinned in wariness.

“I got lost on my way to Clocktown,” Link explained, looking up at her.

She took in his soaked clothes and youthful face, gasping. “You’re just a child!” she exclaimed, her suspicion evaporating. “Come in, come in.”

Link let her usher him inside, thankful for once that his youthful appearance had some benefits. In Clocktown, more than a few town guards had given him strange looks, seeing a young boy carrying around a sword.

“Fetch some towels, Romani!” the young woman ordered, turning to Link. “You poor dear,” she said, stripping off his coat. “You must be freezing.” She gripped Link’s shoulders and steered him towards the hearth.

Grateful, Link stretched out his hands towards the warmth. The house appeared to be two rooms; one large space for the kitchen, table and sitting area, then a walled off section for the sleeping quarters.

A young girl a few years younger than Link appeared from the bedroom, her arms laden with towels.

“Here you go!” she said cheerfully, dropping them in front of him.

Link stared at her. Her hair was fiery red, her eyes cornflower blue. Her features were so reminiscent of Malon that he was taken aback. On second glance, he noted the differences in her face, but it was no less unsettling.

“Er, thanks,” he mumbled, recovering from his shock. He picked up a towel and began to dry the ends of his hair. He didn’t want to take his hat off and reveal Tatl. Most people weren’t used to seeing fairies.

The Malon-look-alike didn’t comment on his staring. The older girl, who had gone to the kitchen area, returned with a bowl and a spoon. Like the little girl, she had vibrant red hair and blue eyes, highlighting a very pretty face.

“It’s not much, but it’ll warm you,” she said with a smile, handing the soup to Link.

He took it with a thank you and sipped. The flavourful broth warmed his stomach much better than the food served by the gorons. Unlike them, Link couldn’t eat rocks.

The older girl tended the fire while the younger sat on a stool next to Link, watching him with open curiosity.

“My name is Cremia,” the young woman introduced herself. “This is my younger sister Romani.”

“I’m named after the ranch,” the girl said proudly. “Well, and mom. We’re famous, you know! Ever heard of Romani Ranch milk?”

“Romani,” Cremia said with a touch of censure, her brows furrowed. She turned to Link. “You said you got lost on the road to Clocktown? Don’t worry. By tomorrow, the storm should pass. I can bring you the rest of the way—it isn’t far.”

“We have to go to town tomorrow,” Romani informed him. “It’s milk delivery day tomorrow.”

Cremia smiled at her sister in a fond way. “Yes.”

Link finished his bowl of soup and handed it back to Cremia. “Thank you. I’m Link. I have a friend who lives on a ranch,” he added to Romani, who squealed in delight.

“Really!? That’s so neat—”

“You’re welcome to stay here tonight, Link,” Cremia interrupted. “I’m afraid we only have one bedroom, but I can make up a pallet in the barn. It will be warm enough,” she assured him, her gaze darting to him.

Link shrugged. “Beats sleeping outside.”

Cremia smiled again and busied herself in the kitchen. With Link’s help, she gathered a pile of spare blankets and they ran to the barn next door, Romani giggling as she danced through mud puddles.

Shutting the barn door, behind them, Cremia sighed and dropped the blankets in a spare stall, gathering straw into a pile to make a makeshift mattress. Several horses and cows poked their heads out to investigate the situation, and Romani walked over to stroke the nose of the nearest horse, a grin on her face.

Link joined her in petting the docile, chestnut mare, when a familiar whinny sounded from the stall across from them. Link spun around in disbelief.

“Epona!?”

Epona whinnied again, nearly jumping out of her stall in her eagerness to see Link again. He crossed to her stall, hugging her around the neck.

“Epona, I’m so happy you’re safe!”

Romani made a cooing noise. “Is this your horse?” she asked excitedly. “Her name’s Epona? What a cute name!”

Hearing the commotion, Cremia came over. “We found her the other day, lost in the road,” she explained. “We hadn’t been able to find her owner.” She laughed when Epona nuzzled against Link’s face. “But clearly she’s missed you.”

“She was...taken from me,” Link explained, avoiding too many details. “I thought whoever had taken her had gotten rid of her.” Patting Epona’s neck, he turned to Cremia. “I can’t thank you enough for taking care of her.”

Cremia flushed. “It was nothing...really...” She reached over to give the filly a pat. “She’s a very sweet horse.”

With a sigh, Cremia pulled away, ushering Romani towards the door. “Tomorrow, you can follow our wagon back to town,” she said. “It’s a short journey.”

“Cremia, what about—”

“Hush, Romani. Good night, Link.”

Link waved as the two girls exited the barn, closing the door firmly behind them. Giving Epona a few pats, he settled into his makeshift bed, taking off his still damp shirt and hat. Tatl flew out, shaking out her wings.

“At least it’s warm in here,” she said around a yawn. 

Tatl flopped into the straw, exhausted, while Link laid out his clothes to dry. Flopping back in the straw, Link huddled under the blankets, leaning over to blow out the lantern Cremia had left for him.

The sound of the rain on the wooden roof continued, broken only by the muted crack of lightning and answering rumble of thunder. Link had spent the night in far worse conditions. During a time that seemed both very near and a lifetime ago, he’d slept in caves, trees, or out under the open sky, not knowing what the next day would bring. In those days, a night of peace and safety had been a rare gift.

Soon enough, the storm lulled him to sleep.


	4. Coast

_Tenura, winter_

Tenura was a large enough city with a vibrant enough population that its inhabitants desired something in the arena of nighttime entertainment.

One such hot spot, Iaxara, was illuminated in blue and white, the rising steps beckoning those on the street to come up and see what lay behind the black curtain at the door. It was an invitation Dark reluctantly accepted, if only because he was expected.

He stepped through the narrow, black-walled hallway and into the main room. The sunken dance floor pulsed with light and energy, its glass surface lit from below to resemble the rush and spill of water. A band, a mix of human and zora musicians, entertained from the raised platform in the middle, their hypnotic tune heard all throughout the space.  
The perimeter of the room was fenced off by a railing, allowing dancers to filter in and out from designated spots on either side. At the far corner was the long, polished counter of the bar, and clustered near it a handful of tables for socializing.

Dark spotted Jeim on a stool near the bar, two women and a man with him. The zora turned at his approach, seafoam green eyes lighting up.

“There he is!” Jeim hopped from his perch and wrapped Dark in an enthusiastic hug. “Late for your own damn birthday party, Mr. I-have-to-make-an-entrance,” he scolded.

Dark gave him a half-smile. “Sorry, I wasn’t sure I wanted to come.”

Jeim tsked, shaking his head. “Come on, Dark, nobody likes their birthday. It’s why we drink. Bartender!” He signaled the beautiful woman behind the counter, who promptly filled a glass for him that he slid across the table to Dark.

Dark took the drink, joining in when Jeim and his companions wished him a happy birthday. He was 20 years old today. The same age he’d been in the time before. The time that had been erased from history.

Gripping the glass hard enough to whiten his knuckles, Dark downed the burning alcohol and passed it to the bartender for another.

In the months he’d been in Tenura, he’d found that Jeim’s belief in drinking dulling all manner of pain was accurate. Now that he was somewhat settled, Dark had noticed the past grasping at his shoulder again. The nightmares. The guilt.

He hadn’t been able to find a single clue as to the whereabouts of the sorcerer, Alatar, nor a way to pass into the Dark World. In truth, he’d all but given up.

If he were even more honest, he wished to abandon his quest altogether. He tipped another drink to his mouth. Sienna deserved better. But what could he do? Dark had failed her time and again. He wasn’t strong enough. 

“Come on,” Jeim’s voice broke through his thoughts. He was dragging him away from the table towards the dance floor.

Dark resisted, but only slightly. His shield of numbness slipped slightly as his friend’s infectious good humour cracked through. He and Jeim joined the crush of bodies, letting the music quiet his mind, the movement revive his body.

Jeim smiled. “At least you appear to be having a good time,” he teased. “Why do you so dislike your birthday?”

Dark shrugged in answer. He wasn’t even certain today was his birthday. He’d been too young when his parents died, and there was no one else alive who could tell him. Fierce claimed it was today, and he’d never questioned it.

Thoughts of Fierce caused his mind to slam shut again. He hadn’t spoken to his self-appointed guardian for nearly two years.

Dark shoved thoughts of Fierce and all others from his mind. He was supposed to be celebrating. The song changed, and he and Jeim continued to dance, the lights and people around them becoming a swirling, dizzying mass, his vision narrowing into a small sphere of awareness.

On the edges of the circle, Dark caught a flash of something familiar, causing a spike of adrenaline, as if he felt danger near. He slowed, turned his head, but there was nothing. He moved in a circle, searching the crowd for what didn’t seem to belong.

There it was again; a sliver of a face. A mirror image of himself, staring at him from between the dancers. His shadowy copy, Kai. Like a ghost, his double had taken to haunting him, spurred by his own sense of guilt.

“Go away,” he hissed at the shadow when he appeared again.

Kai glared at him, crimson eyes sparking with contained fury. He vanished as another body swung past, obstructing his view.

“Another drink?” Jeim asked from behind him.

Dark clenched his jaw, hoping no one saw him talking to thin air. He turned to Jeim and plastered on a tight smile. “Sure, thanks.”

No sooner had Jeim left for the bar than a pair of hands wrapped around Dark’s waist. He tensed and looked down. Painted fingernails.

“I’ve been looking at you since you walked in the door,” a feminine voice purred in his ear.

He faced her, taking in a woman with short blonde hair, brown eyes and lips painted the same arresting red as her nails. Her hands crawled up his spine, securing him in her hold.

“I thought you could use a bit of cheering up,” she added, her lips curving. “All tall, dark and brooding over here.”

“I’m not brooding,” he objected. She smelled like freesia, her smile beguiling. The slight weight of the wooden vial around his neck was warm in the hollow of his throat; it held dried flower petals from Sienna.

The woman pursed her lips, tilted her head. “No? You don’t seem to be enjoying yourself.”

I’m not, he thought. Out loud he replied, “I think that’s starting to change.”

Seeing a sign of responsiveness, she grinned wider. Her painted nails scratched lightly on his back, her hips brushed across his as they danced. When she took his hands and pulled him deeper into the crowd, he didn’t stop her. When her hands touched his face, her eyes tracing his features without meeting his, he didn’t pull away.

Her mouth was as soft and full as it looked, the scent of her perfume subtle and pleasant. The last woman he’d kissed had been Aalriann. Dark suddenly wished he was back in the Gerudo encampment again, instead. His fingers wrapped around the woman’s upper arms, but he hesitated.

It felt wrong, down to his very core, to embrace a woman, a stranger who had yet to look him in the eyes. But there was a sliver of familiarity, of comfort. She was warm and willing, and she pulled him closer eagerly. Relaxing his grip on her arms, Dark let his slide around her. His body acted for him while he let his mind ignore the twisting in his heart.  
He raised the wall of numbness back around himself, keeping it firmly in place when she took his hand and led him out of Iaxara.

**********   
_Termina, many years ago..._

The next morning, Link helped Cremia load up their wagon with huge jugs of fresh milk, to be delivered to the Clocktown market.

Romani saddled Epona for him, and he climbed up with the ease of familiarity, patting her neck fondly. She nickered, eager to get a move on as he. Romani climbed up beside her older sister, who snapped the reins. The wagon was old and slow over the road, muddied by last night’s storm, but Link didn’t mind. He planned to spend this final day in Clocktown gathering information and whatever resources he might need for the trip to the west.

Tatl told him that the Great Bay, which connected Termina to the Southern Sea, was the most likely place to search next, if they followed Tael’s instructions: Swamp, Mountain, Ocean, Canyon.

As they traveled out of Romani Ranch, Cremia took a right, leading them a sheltered road bordered on both sides by a ridge dotted with trees. Link urged Epona to move up next to the wagon seat, keeping one eye on the treeline. He noticed the tension in Cremia’s shoulders, how she twisted her hands on the reins.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“This is the quickest way,” Cremia explained. “And the only way, now that the main road was block by this huge boulder—” Link saw Tatl flinch at this and deduced that the Skullkid was the one responsible for the obstacle.

“But lately there have been...” Cremia trailed off, her blue eyes blowing wide in panic. “Oh, no!”

With a cry, two horsemen bounded out of the cover of the woods, their agile mounts clearing the jump and landing on the hard-packed road behind the wagon. The two men wore black masks to cover all but their eyes, and wielded short-handled axes and picks as their weapons. Cremia gasped and slapped the reins against the wagon horse’s back frantically. Startled, it took off in an unsteady gallop. With speed on their side, the bandits gave chase.

Link threw aside Epona’s reins, trusting his mare to keep steady. Flanking the wagon, the bandits lashed at the covered back, tearing it open.

Link reached for his bow, letting the first arrow fly. It struck the spot where the first bandit’s hand had been a second before, wobbling as it wedged into the wagon’s side. Shouting in surprise, the bandit fell back, darting a murderous glare at Link. The other man was undeterred on the other side of the wagon from Link, hacking at the wheels to try and force Cremia to a stop.

Link loosed another arrow, striking the man in the arm, wanting to discourage, not mortally wound. The man howled in pain, retreating. The first bandit charged forward, swinging his axe at Link’s head. Link ducked, and the axehead buried itself in the wagon’s sturdy back end.

Left without a weapon, the bandit aimed with his fists instead, but Link had pulled Epona back to ride beside the masked man. While the bandit tried to twist in the saddle to better aim, Link leaned down and sliced through the saddle’s strap. The bandit slid to the side and was tossed off his mount, rolling in the dirt until he came to a stop. Picking up his head, he screamed and cursed at Link, shaking his hands in the air.

Romani, recovered from the fright, peeked over her shoulder to see what had happened and burst out laughing at the sight. Cremia let the wagon horse slow its steps, pressing a hand to her chest.

“Thank the gods,” she said, turning to Link as he pulled up beside them again. “Thank you!”

Link nodded back. “Hopefully they won’t bother you anymore.”

“Your sword must be really sharp!” Romani piped up, glancing at the weapon. “Can I try it sometime?”

“No!” Cremia gasped.

Link smiled. “Maybe when you’re older.”

Link didn’t mention that the saddle’s leather strap had already been partly torn and weakened, or that he hadn’t counted on the plan working. Sometimes, not having a real plan was a plan.

The rest of their journey passed without incident, and Cremia and Romani let him off in Clocktown. After saying goodbye, Link and Tatl spent the day gathering what they might need for their journey before Link took the ocarina and lifted it to play.

As the final notes of the Song of Time echoed in his ears, Link faced west, where the sun was beginning to set on the third day. Tomorrow, yet another adventure awaited.

Great Bay sprawled before him—a shimmering expanse of blues. Link was awed. He’d heard stories, read books, but nothing compared to looking out at the never-ending waves, reaching all the way to the horizon and beyond. Farther than he could see, there was water. If he squinted, Link wondered if he could spot the Hylian shoreline, far to the west.  
Link wished he could spend the rest of the day sitting on the beach and watching the waves, but it was nearly noon already. 

On the Termina side of Great Bay, there was a handful of settlements on the beach, including some fishermen’s shacks and seaside shops. In the shallows, perched atop stilts, was a small, round house with a metal hook protruding from the roof.

After leaving Epona to graze in the grass near the beach, Link waded out into the water, intending to investigate. As he neared the house, a flurry of movement farther out in the water caught his eye.

A flock of squawking seagulls circled in the air above a large object floating on the surface. When the object moved, Link jumped into deeper water, swimming over to take a closer look.

It didn’t take long to realize it wasn’t a piece of debris floating in the water at all—it was a person. A zora bobbed face down in the water, his limbs limp and his eyes closed. Grabbing the zora’s arm, Link began to swim backwards, tugging him back to shore. When he lifted his head again with a groan, Link quickened his strokes.

Luckily, he wasn’t too heavy, and Link was able to pull him up onto the beach. Flipping him, he saw the fresh, deep wound in the zora’s abdomen. With a gasp, he opened unfocused eyes.

“It’s okay,” Link told him when he began muttering indistinctly. “I brought you back to the beach.”

The zora breathed shallowly, but his dark eyes finally focused on Link. “Lu...lu,” he mumbled, sighing. “I didn’t...”

His head dropped back into the sand in exhaustion. Covering the zora’s entire right arm and shoulder was an intricate tattoo with blue and red ink. Around his waist, wrists and neck was jewelry made of bone and seashell. 

“Guitar,” he suddenly gasped, seizing Link’s wrist.

Link glanced back at the water, spotting the white object caught in the surf near where he’d been floating. Walking over to retrieve it, Link picked up what seemed to be a long fish skeleton, with several strings tied side by side and attached on each end. He’d never seen a guitar like this before; it was unique.

Resting the guitar next to the ailing zora, Link knelt. “I brought your guitar,” he told him. He didn’t move, but his gaze swung towards the shore.

“...Have to go back.”

Link frowned. “Go back where? What happened to you?”

He drew in a slow, unsteady breath. “Went to the pirate fortress,” he said hoarsely. “To save her...couldn’t get back out.”

Link glanced at the piercing wound in the zora’s stomach. Blood seeped out slowly but steadily.

Tatl hovered close to Link’s ear. “I don’t think he’s going to make it,” she whispered.

Grimacing, Link didn’t answer, but he knew the fairy was right.

“What’s your name?” he prodded, giving the zora’s shoulder a shake to get him to reopen his eyes.

“Mikau,” he gasped, his frame jerking in pain. “Tell her...tell Lulu—”

Mikau shuddered, his voice fading as he used all his remaining energy to continue drawing breath. His eyes closed and didn’t open again. Aside from his shallow breaths, he didn’t move.

Pulling the ocarina from his pocket, Link let the notes of the salesman’s Song of Healing flow out. Some of the tension left the guitarist’s body, and he let out a long, slow breath. As the last notes of the song faded, Link lowered the ocarina.

“He’s gone,” Tatl said, flying over near Mikau’s head.

Mikau’s body began to vanish, becoming hazy and transparent, and then disappearing completely, leaving only a red stain on the sand. In his place was a mask of Mikau’s likeness. The mask’s mouth was curled upwards in a roguish smirk, while the dark blue eyes stared up at Link with rebellious defiance.

“What now?” Tatl asked, frowning.

Link stowed the mask in his rucksack and reached for Mikau’s discarded guitar. Shaking off the sand, he found sturdy palm tree and propped the guitar against it, digging the base into the sand to keep it in place. 

“We were able to meet the last two Guardians only after solving the trouble caused by Majora,” Link reasoned. “Mikau said he was trying to save someone; we should start there.”

Tatl was skeptical. “How do we find out? He mentioned a pirate fortress? Who knows where that is. You’re the expert in saving people.”

Link nodded towards the house built above the shallows. “We’ll start there. We’ll ask the fishermen who live here if anything strange has been going on lately. They might know something.”

He turned to the house on stilts out in the bay. They would start there.

**********   
_Tenura, spring_

Boots in one hand, shirt in the other, Dark turned on his way out the front door. She leaned on the door frame, smiling, gaze roving over his bare chest in appreciation. She wore only a robe over her nakedness, one hand braced on the door to keep it semi-closed. While he shrugged back into his shirt, her attention flickered over him. It didn’t escape his notice that she didn’t quite meet his eyes.

“That was fun,” she murmured while Dark tugged on his boots. “Maybe we’ll see each other again.”

By the time Dark looked up from his task, she’d already closed the door in his face. Looking away from its weathered surface, Dark trudged back onto the main street. Dawn was just starting to lighten the sky. The streets were quiet.

A familiar sensation welled up in him. Weariness dragged at him. The picture of the brunette’s pretty face melted together with so many other memories of leaving darkened bedrooms and cold, grey light spilling over the horizon. The voracious beast of loneliness gnawed another chunk out of him.

With every step, the sun rose a bit higher. There was an unusual chill in the air, but he hardly noticed. He pretended to watch where he was going. Pretended not to think about walking in to find the bed empty.

Dark ambled along until he came to a familiar road. He planned to head for home and get some actual sleep now. With a sigh, he remembered his promise to pick up Jeim’s delivery, and turned left. The post office wasn’t far.

The postman was up early, sorting through the morning’s deliveries. He lifted his head to greet Dark with a friendly smile. Dark gave the man Jeim’s name, and he dutifully retrieved a wrapped package for him.

Dark set some rupees on the counter and signed on the slip of receipt the postman handed him. Glancing at the signature, the postman frowned, then hummed.

“Just a moment,” he called as Dark was leaving, the package in his hands. “I might have something for you.”

Confused, Dark came back to the counter. Who would be sending him mail?

The postman returned from the back room with a box stuffed with letters. “Lost letters get bounced all over the place,” he muttered, sifting through the box’s contents. “We keep track of who comes to the post office to try and return ‘em to the right owners. And some letters were dropped off here a few weeks ago with your name…ah, here we go.”

The postman dropped a stack of letters in front of Dark. Curious, he picked them up, eyebrows shooting up when he saw the address. The letters were all from Link.

Tearing open the top one, Dark flipped through multiple handwritten pages. The last page was only partway filled, ending with Link’s signature.

“They’ve taken a long time to find you!” the postman said, stowing the box under the counter. “No charge for these.”

“Wait.” Dark ripped off the unused end of the last page and grabbed a pencil off the counter. He scribbled the post office’s address on it, folded it and handed it to the postman. “Send this back to him.”

The postman took it with a nod, adding it to the day’s deliveries.

“Thanks,” Dark said, backing out the door with the stack of letters in one hand and the package in another.

On the long walk back from town, Dark read Link’s letters one-handed. They’d been sent over the course of the last year, since he’d left Gerudo Valley. Guilt washed over him for not keeping in contact with Link, but at the time he’d only wanted to leave. Now that he’d settled in Tenura somewhat, everything was catching up to him.

When he reached the shack on the beach, he stuffed the letters into his pocket and unlocked the door. He walked through the dark shop and unlocked the second door to the rest of the house. Tossing his boots on the floor, he went to the kitchen and bent down at the hearth. It was cool in the house, everything still and quiet.

With a quick snap of fingers, Dark lit the cold hearth, and the warmth began to seep into the house’s creaking walls. Taking the stairs as quietly as possible, Dark went into his bedroom, noting that Jeim’s bedroom door was still shut.

Link’s letters he left on his desk, before opening the wardrobe to grab a fresh set of clothes. Clothes in hand, he padded to the bathroom, stepping into the shower and cranking the heat as high as he could. The house’s pipes groaned in protest, and the jet of water that gushed out was icy at first, as it had come directly from the house’s water tank outside. 

Dark stayed in the lukewarm spray until the water supply was exhausted. In his mind he reread his brother’s letters, asking him to write back, wondering where in the world he was. Link was right to be annoyed with him. 

Those weeks on the road, searching fruitlessly, and now these past several months with Jeim had a sense of duality to them. It seemed ages since he’d left the desert, and at the same time only yesterday. 

Living with Jeim in Tenura was carefree, easy and fun. There was nothing to burden him. Nothing to tie him down. But always in the back of his mind was the darker side of the coin—guilt, loneliness, numbness. Emptiness.

He knew Jeim saw it. That his friend did everything he knew to keep Dark’s spirits up. But Jeim couldn’t understand the internal struggle spreading inside him—a slow, relentless, devouring sickness.

Droplets of water tapped against his forehead. Dark turned the water off, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around himself. Snatching up his clothes, he opted to lay down in bed, suddenly overcome with weariness, instead of getting dressed for the day.

Jeim’s bedroom door clicked open when he reached the hallway, revealing the still half-asleep zora.

“M’nin,” he mumbled, rubbing the heel of his hand into his eye.

“Morning,” Dark said, arching a brow.

Behind Jeim, a female zora exited the room with a yawn, followed by a Hylian woman and man. None of whom were wearing clothes. They glanced at Dark in curiosity as they passed; he nodded back politely.

“Any chance of you cooking breakfast?” Jeim asked with a winsome smile.

Dark snorted, thinking of the last time Jeim had tried to cook something. “To feed the harem, you mean? Sure, I can make something.”

Jeim stifled a yawn. “Thanks. You’re awesome. I’m going to take a shower. Any water left?”

Dark smirked. Jeim caught the look and groaned. “I take it back. You’re despicable.”

“Feel free to put out a roommate wanted notice,” Dark replied. “Good luck finding one who cooks as well as me.”

Jeim chuckled and ducked into his room, returning with a pair of shorts and an assortment of sheets and towels. They went downstairs, Dark busying himself with breakfast and Jeim passing out makeshift clothing to his guests.

After a full breakfast and a lengthy goodbye to Jeim’s guests that Dark pretended not to notice, the pair of them took a cup of coffee and sat in chairs on the house’s front deck, overlooking the beach.

The morning tradition was one he relished. Jeim let him enjoy a moment of quiet, listening to the seagulls and surf, while he cleaned his surfboard and sipped his coffee.   
Today, though, he had other things on his mind.

“I need to leave Tenura,” Dark said bluntly. Jeim paused in his polishing. “It’s my brother,” he explained. “I’ve been gone for the better part of a year, and I should go back to Hyrule and see him.”

Dark explained about his trip to the post office that morning, and the stack of Link’s letters. The zora frowned at him over the board.

“I can’t say I’m happy to see you go,” Jeim admitted. His mouth curled. “Not to inflate your ego anymore, but I like having you as my roommate.”

Dark grinned back. “It’s not like I won’t come visit.”

Jeim shrugged, looking away. “Castle Town is a long way away. And you’ll be busy.”

“Not that busy,” he assured him. “And I can warp, you know. I’ll set up a warp point right here, so I can drop in anytime I want—and see things that will scald my brain,” he joked.

Jeim laughed. “You can do that?”

“What, warp?”

“Yeah.”

“Sure. I learned how to do it without the help of a magical item, and as long as you don’t ward any part of your house, it’ll be fine.”

He smiled crookedly. “The more I learn about you Hylians and magic, the more I realize how much I don’t know.”

Dark’s lips twitched. “Well, I can tell you what you want to know. Fair trade for your lessons on zora anatomy. I definitely never needed to know some zora can spit venom from glands at the back of their throats.”

Jeim snorted. “Sure. I’ll have to quiz you before you go.” With a sigh, he leaned back in his chair, lifting his coffee to his mouth. They looked out at the ocean waves rolling on the shore. “When do you leave?” he asked.

“The end of the week.”

Jeim nodded and took another drink. He glanced sideways at Dark. “I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll miss you too. Horrifying anatomy and all.”

Jeim snickered.

**********

Beneath the water was a beautiful, unexplored world.

The shifting sands of the seabed glowed, its surface marbled by the sunlight refracting through the water. All around were schools of colourful fish, their fins flashing silver and gold. Strands of seaweed drifted with the push and pull of the ocean, hypnotic in their underwater dance.

Through a zora’s eyes, Link saw everything clear as crystal. The salt didn’t sting. The water was cool and welcoming. He spun and cleaved through it without resistance, a living torpedo. It was effortless. As a zora, Link’s muscles were lean and his movements graceful. His speed underwater was unmatched.

From the inhabitant of the stilt-house, an eccentric Hylian scientist Link had met once before, in another time and place—not that the man remembered—Link had discovered that a gang of pirates had indeed stolen some zora eggs.

The mother, a member of the local zora colony and the singer of Mikau’s troupe, was inconsolable. The scientist’s map of the Great Bay only covered land, but he’d pointed Link in the direction of the pirates’ hideout. 

In a sheltered cove north of the zora colony, the pirates were rumoured to moor. They’d been a threat in the area for years, the old man had said, growing lately in strength and number.

Link wasn’t sure he could defeat all the pirates on his own, but if he rescued the eggs for the singer, Lulu, the local zoras might be more inclined to help him. Or they might know where to find the Great Bay Guardian.

Just as the old man said, Link arrived at an imposing cliff that wrapped around the north edge of the bay, the rocks hiding corners and inlets perfect for ambush. Link’s plan to sneak in underwater was dashed when he saw the entrance to the pirates’ fortress.

A colossal gate of wood and stone barred the mouth of the cove, sinking down to the sea floor and rising to the top of the cliffs. Barnacles and algae were suckered to the wood grain, toughening its surface. There was nowhere to wedge in, nowhere to climb up. It was impenetrable.

Link swam to the base of the cliffs, looking for a way in. But the rocks held no secret tunnels. There had to be another way in.

Just before he was set to go on a further search of the area, Link felt vibrations in the water. A tremor clawed up the back of his neck. He spun around and gasped, sucking in water instead of air and having to remind himself that he didn’t need to worry about choking.

A huge, black form scythed its way towards him. It was the hull of a ship, charging towards the closed gate. Link dove deeper, avoiding the battering of the hull, and watched as the gates began to crank open. They wouldn’t stay open long.

Link dashed through the opening in the gate beneath the ship. There was barely enough room to squeeze through between it and the sea floor, but he made it. Inside the cove, the bottom dropped off steeply. Above, there were more shadows of ships patrolling on the water, watching for intruders.

Link peered into the gloomier, darker waters here in the cove, swimming closer to the fortress wall built right into the rock. There was a large tunnel with a grate over it, allowing water to pass into the basement of the fortress as well as flow out. Yanking on the grate, no surprise, proved fruitless, so Link swam away, turned, and charged.

Focusing his magic as he had done at Snowhead, Link created a magical barrier around him, harrowing it into a point at the top of his head. He smashed into the grate at full speed, the magical spearheaded barrier wrenching the metal from its holdings. The grate came free, sinking slowly into the blackness below.

Hoping the impact hadn’t alerted anyone, Link swam into the tunnel, navigating underwater passages until he came to a metal ramp. Popping his head out of the water, he made sure there were no guards present in what looked to be a storeroom before climbing out and reaching for the bottle tied to his belt. Uncorking it, he let Tatl free. Unlike him in his new zora form, she couldn’t breathe underwater.

“That was fun,” she remarked with a grin. “I always found breaking into places kind of thrilling.”

Link arched a brow—or the skin where his eyebrow should have been. “You’re really different from other fairies I’ve met. Most don’t like breaking the rules.”

“Rules schmules,” Tatl complained. “Let’s get on with it.”

Link removed the Zora mask, being smaller and stealthier as a human. He and Tatl explored the lower levels of the fortress, mostly dedicated to storage and communal sleeping quarters, all currently empty.

In the central square of the fortress, Link ducked behind a stack of crates full of ammunition, surveying the dozens of guards on patrol both on the ground and in the tower in the centre. From the top, scouts could see out into the cove and over the huge gate, as well as the top of all four walls. The pirates were an assortment of different peoples, but many of them were Gerudo, which surprised Link. He imagined these women had split from their tribes in the desert to pursue a life of crime.

He was still mapping out the best way to get to the other side of the fortress without being spotted, when a gate on the south side of the courtyard opened, and a swarm of Gerudo guards marched through.

Link crawled closer, hiding behind more stacks of supplies. Behind the pirates shuffled a group of prisoners in shackles. Link frowned, seeing the lowered heads of the prisoners, their dirty and ripped clothes, the reddened rawness of the skin of their wrists and ankles.

One of the prisoners, a blonde woman, stumbled on her way crossing the courtyard, crashing to her knees, unable to brace herself with her bonds.

“Get up!” shouted her guard, prodding the woman with the end of her spear. Link prepared to surge to his feet.

“Don’t,” Tatl warned him. “We can’t do anything for them.”

Link released the hilt of his sword and sunk back into his hiding spot. He knew the futility of trying to fight the pirate fleet on his own, but it didn’t take away the frustration of not being able to help.

Link stared at the woman’s profile as she stood up. Her face was marred with dirt, her shoulder drooped with exhaustion. Ignoring the frown on the pirate’s face, the woman straightened, lifted her chin, tucked her dirty blonde hair behind a pointed ear. She kept walking, her chains rattling with each step.

Her act of quiet defiance went unpunished by the pirates. The other prisoners followed in her steps, until the woman crossed the square and disappeared inside the fortress.  
Tatl nudged him. “We need to keep moving.”

Link at last looked away from the scene, a strange feeling pricking the back of his mind. Whatever the thought was, it slipped back into his subconscious too quickly to be recognized. 

With the help of his hookshot, Link scaled the fortress’s walls to the very top, avoiding the sights of the pirates on guard. In the most heavily fortified section of the base, he found what he was looking for.

The pirates’ leader was a Gerudo woman in her 40s, wearing a mix of traditional Gerudo clothing and homemade armour. Instead of a Gerudo scimitar, spear or shield, she sported twin cutlasses on her hips. Link was hiding in the rafters, observing the proceedings.

The pirate leader was displeased. She paced in front of the overstuffed, cushioned chair that served as her throne, one of her underlings standing nervously in front of her.  
“You’re telling me we lost another ship?” the pirate queen growled.

“It was the storm, Aveil,” the other pirate explained, twisting her hands anxiously. “It’s spreading throughout the bay…once you’re caught in it, it’s nearly impossible to get away! It’s not natural!”

Aveil hissed air through her teeth. She stalked to the large aquarium next to her throne. Inside, sitting on the bottom were half a dozen round, blue objects. The zora eggs.

Aveil glared at the glass. “The imp assured me that these were the key to stopping this storm,” she murmured.

Link slid over to the next beam, straining to hear her better.

“We need to get the last one back,” she finished, turning her back on the aquarium. “Send out more ships.”

“But, Aveil…”

“Quiet! Do as I say! I don’t care if we need to search the entire ocean!”

Cowed, the pirate bowed and left the room, calling out orders to someone outside the room. Link swung his leg over the beam, wrapping his arms around the attached pillar and sliding down into the shadows. Aveil had returned to her chair, her back to him.

Link glanced between her and the aquarium. He needed a way to get Aveil out of the room. If he tried to fight her, she would call for reinforcements.

“Link, look,” Tatl muttered, flying back up towards the ceiling.

Stuck to one of the rafters like a barnacle was a hornet’s nest, faintly buzzing with activity. Link grinned. A careful arrow shot later, the nest dropped like a live bomb right in front of Aveil.

It blew open, releasing the angry hive on the unsuspecting pirate queen. Aveil shrieked in alarm, sprinting from the room to avoid the stinging swarm.

Stepping out of his hiding spot, Link popped on the Zora mask and climbed to the top of the aquarium. It was big enough to swim in—all it took was a few empty bottles and he’d scooped up the captive zora eggs.

Prize in hand, Link retreated the way he’d come. Back in the central square, there was pandemonium. Pirates streamed through like ants, grabbing weapons and ammunition on their way out the gate. Something had happened.

“What’s up with them?” Tatl asked.

“Whatever it is, it’s a great distraction,” Link replied. “We can sneak out of here and go get the last egg. I’m betting the strange storm the pirates are worried about is the centre of the problems here. Whatever’s causing it may lead us to the next Guardian.”

When the courtyard emptied, Link jumped down to the ground floor and made his way back down to the basement. As a zora, Link hopped back into the flooded tunnels and followed them back to the cove.

On the surface, the pirates were mobilizing, dozens of small boats setting out. The gate had been thrown open, with several huge battle ships waiting in the bay, facing in towards the fortress.

Vibrations rippled through the water. Not from the boats. From below.

Link stopped swimming, looking down into the murky bottom. A black shadow glided through the water, circling, swimming higher. Link shot for the surface, arcing out of the cove and landing on a rock shelf over the water. The shadow in the water grew larger and larger as it swam up. Jaws wider than the pirates’ battle ships breached the water. Caught in the grip of sharklike teeth, three of the boats were shredded into splinters while the screaming pirates jumped overboard.

The fish’s powerful, scaled body knifed back and forth before it splashed back into the cove’s depths.

Link looked at Tatl. “What is that thing!?”

Tatl gaped at the ripples left behind. “It’s…not possible!” she cried. “It’s a gyorg!”

Link frowned in confusion. “A what?”

“A prehistoric beast. They’re supposed to be long extinct!”

Link bent his knees and dove into the water. Tatl’s jaw dropped. Link scythed through the water, building speed as he approached the giant fish.

Catching sight of Link, the gyorg jerked its thick tail, charging, jaws wide. Link spun out of the way, pushing off the fortress wall. The gyorg chased him, razor-sharp teeth snapping at Link’s foot fins. A muffled boom preceded a cannoball crashing through the water. Link ducked, but the gyorg wasn’t so lucky.

The projectile smashed into its face, disorienting it. Link spun and surged ahead, striking the fish with a magical version of a cannonball. The fish shook off its confusion, its armoured exterior protecting it from harm.

Link inwardly cursed, swimming out of the way of the fish’s counterattack. The pirates rained down more cannoballs and spears, all of which bounced off the gyorg’s tough scales. The fish opened its jaws, trying to swallow Link, but it was bigger and slower.

Seizing on an idea, Link charged up his magical barrier again, widening it so it covered his entire body. Then, he aimed for the surface, breaching the water like an arrow. Twisting around, he stretched out his arms in a dive, aiming for the razor-rimmed maw of the gyorg waiting for him.

Link dove straight into the fish’s mouth, expending all his magic outward. The force of it ripped into the beast from inside with arcs of energy, slicing straight through. Link was thrown against the wall of the fortress upside down. When his vision cleared, the prehistoric fish was so much bloody flotsam drifting in the water. Sinking to the bottom was a colourful, scaled mask, as well as a pale blue egg. Link dove for them.

“Alright!” Tatl cheered when Link surfaced. He climbed back onto the rock shelf, out of sight of the pirates.

Their boats converged on the remains of the giant fish, celebrating their supposed victory, thinking the cannonballs had done it in. Link shook the excess water off the gyorg mask. He grinned at the sneering face of the fish.

Three down.

***********

Lulu’s deep blue eyes locked on Link.

She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. Mikau, she mouthed.

Link smiled, hoping it was convincing. The other members of the zora band, the Indigo-gos, hadn’t realized he wasn’t the real Mikau. Upon arrival at the Great Bay colony, he’d been greeted warmly and ushered straight through the spacious concert hall to where Lulu waited.

The loss of her eggs had caused her to lose her voice—cancelling the band’s performances and plunging her into a depression. All the other band members seemed to think Mikau would be able to help her.

Feeling like a poor substitute, Link held out his hand to Lulu. “I need to show you something.”

She accepted his hand, but the shadow of grief didn’t leave her eyes. Slowly, Link turned and led her back into the concert hall. 

The hall was really a vast cavern, halfway below sea level and halfway above. Outside it was a chunk of black rock, inside was the stage with the iridescent gleam of a shell. Link and Lulu walked the perimeter of the hall, past the bands’ dressing rooms. Link stopped at Mikau’s door.

Lulu waited, her face almost blank, but Link saw the pain threatening to break through. He opened the door and stepped aside. Waiting for her was the eccentric scientist, bent over a small aquarium, watching the last of the recovered eggs hatch. Lulu gasped, her voice hoarse.

She and Link stood in front of the aquarium, watching the newborn zora tadpoles, their eyes still dark and pupil-less, swim around each other. As a group, they began to sing, young voices rising and falling, echoing one another. Lulu’s eyes filled with tears, sliding down her cheeks. But she smiled.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Lulu, dressed in a flowing, navy blue dress, her long, waved fins fluttering with the sweeping of her arms, was a lovely sight; her high, clear voice strong. The pearl in the shell.  
Behind her, Link and the other Indigo-gos played alongside her, strumming the melody the newborn zora had sung. Lulu had recognized the notes; a beloved favourite of hers. She’d found her voice again.

The cheers from their zora audience were deafening when their performance ended. Link’s attempts at guitar playing—using Mikau’s back up instrument—was evidently skilled enough. He’d snuck away after the concert to replace the guitar in Mikau’s room when Lulu appeared in the doorway.

“Come with me,” she said, her expression serious again.

She brought Link back outside to the platform where he’d first found her. Floating in the water was an island that hadn’t been there before. Puzzled, Link was about to open his mouth when the island moved.

Startled, Link jumped back, but Lulu placed her hand on his arm. The island turned, a long shape lifting out of the water. Two huge, black eyes blinked at him. It wasn’t an island at all, but a giant sea turtle.

Shaking the water off its head, it spoke, “I’ve been waiting for you.”

“He can guide you to the bay Guardian,” Lulu told him, releasing his arm.

Link glanced at her, unsure how she knew of his mission. She smiled again.

“I know you can’t stay,” she continued. “But thank you for returning our eggs. And for…” she paused, her gaze roaming his face. “Letting me sing with Mikau one last time.”

Link met her eyes, waiting a few quiet seconds before slowly reaching up to remove the Zora mask. Himself again, Link held it out to her.

“I left his guitar on the other side of the bay,” he said. “Under a palm tree near the fishermen’s huts.”

Lulu nodded, holding the mask to her chest. Link turned back to the sea turtle, patiently waiting. Link climbed the turtle’s shell, covered in sand and rough grass. In the centre, three palm trees grew at diagonal angles.

“Wait in the middle,” the turtle instructed, drifting away from the rock. “You can speak to the Guardian.”

Sitting cross-legged in the centre of the trees, it took only a moment for the energy to shift. Link opened his eyes once more in the realm of the Guardians. The thick fog swirled around the tall platform. Tatl’s wings glowed faintly. In the distance, the third Guardian called out to them with its bellowing wail.

“Help…our…friend,” Tatl translated. “Their friend? Wait, come back!”

The giant was retreating into the fog, like the others, his message given. 

“Let him go,” Link said. “We need to hurry and find the last one.”

Tatl sighed. “You’re right.” Her expression pinched with anxiety. “Do you think he means Skullkid? Do you really think he can be helped?”

“I don’t know,” Link answered honestly. 

The chaos the skullkid had wreaked on Termina was widespread—but how much was his own trickery and how much was the influence of Majora’s Mask? Could the skullkid be freed from its grasp?

They would have an answer soon. There was one last Guardian to free.

And then they would face Majora.


	5. Canyon

He woke up in his bedroom in the Snowhead cottage. Judging by the light filtering in the sole window, it was still morning. All was quiet.

Dark sat up in the bed, yawning. He crossed to the wardrobe, opening the doors. It was empty. Dark frowned. Leaving the bedroom, he wandered into the main room of the house, peering into the kitchen. The house was completely empty—still empty, just as he’d left it years ago.

Dark went outside. The mountains of Snowhead cradled the green valley, snow-topped and imposing. Looking around, Dark tried to ascertain what was causing his sense of unease. Something was wrong.

The landscape was almost familiar. Almost. The creek on the west side of the valley wasn’t there anymore. There were some trees that weren’t in the position they usually occupied. Dark had lived in the cottage for years, and its surroundings were imprinted in his mind like a map.

Was he dreaming? Had he slipped into some alternate universe?

Dark halted mid-step. Alternate universe. This wasn’t Snowhead. 

He turned in a slow circle. The mountains of Snowhead seemed further away than usual. The trees were no longer green, but tinged with grey, as if colour had been leached from their boughs. There were no birds singing. No wind blowing through the pass. Nothing at all.

He was in the Dark World.

Dark whipped his head around. There had to be a way out.

There were two ways out of the valley—the pass and the road to the Goron village. Dark ran towards the pass out of the mountains, only subconsciously noting the absence of trees where they should have been—the presence where they shouldn’t be. Sliding in loose snow, Dark nearly pinwheeled over an edge that he wasn’t expecting.

Instead of the road, there was a chasm, stretching more than a hundred feet across, cutting him off from the rest of Termina. Heading towards the Goron village proved equally impossible when he came to a dead end that didn’t exist in the Light World.

His other option was to start climbing and hope he found a way through. But then what? He didn’t have the first idea how to navigate this world. 

“Feeling lost?” a man’s voice rasped.

Dark knew the speaker was Alatar before he turned to see the sorcerer standing between him and the cottage, his black robes hanging on his wiry frame, his vulturish features pinched in a glare.

His muted memory came roaring back to the surface—his departure from Tenura, traveling the long road north back to central Hyrule. Not long into the journey, a shadow portal had exploded through the ground before him, releasing a legion of nightmarish shadow monsters he’d tried in vain to fight off.

He was Alatar’s captive again.

“If you think to escape again into the Twilis’ realm, it won’t be so easy,” Alatar hissed. “You won’t be getting away until I complete the ritual this time.”

Dark’s hands curled into fists. “You won’t—”

His retort was cut off by a slice of agony across his chest. Dark crumpled to his knees, clutching his heart. Pain throbbed through his entire body in paralyzing waves. Blood was seeping from the old scar, now reopened and raw. 

“What?” he gasped.

Alatar laughed wheezily. Shadow beasts appeared on the edges of his vision, creeping closer. They flanked the dark sorcerer, waiting his command. Their hulking forms crouched next to Alatar, their sightless faces turned towards Dark. 

“We’ll see how long you last,” he taunted Dark.

Alatar’s form shimmered and vanished, leaving Dark alone with the shadow creatures. As they closed in on him, Dark felt stark terror rise in him. The pain was ebbing, but the curse’s evil was curling around him, enveloping him. Blackness encroached on his vision as the first of the beasts approached, letting loose an unearthly howl that shook the entire valley.

Dark crawled backwards, hampered by pain but fueled by fear. The nearest beast thrashed, its hand smashing into Dark and pinning him to the ground. Panicked, Dark clawed uselessly at the thing’s huge hand, unable to even scratch the black, leathery flesh. Talons punctured below his collarbone, snapping bone. Another slash over his heart made him scream.

The echoing answer of the shadow beasts’ shriek was lost as darkness closed in.

**********

Epona snorted nervously, tossing her head in a warning to Link. 

He shared her unease. The suffocating walls of the canyon were narrow and winding. Link was never sure what was behind the next blind corner. Somehow, he felt caught in a labyrinth, being lead into a trap without escape.

Ikana Canyon, far to the east of Clocktown, was one of Termina’s most mysterious regions. The townspeople called it haunted. No one lived within several miles of it—Link, Tatl and Epona were alone.

It hadn’t escaped Link’s notice that they were surrounded by bare rock. No plants sprouted from the dirt. No animals crossed their path. The deeper they headed into Ikana, the stranger their environs became.

Link checked the position of the sun multiple times. It was barely past midday. Yet in Ikana it was perpetual dusk; the light didn’t reach into the canyon walls.

“Link,” Tatl whispered anxiously. “I’m not sure…but I think we’re being watched.”

Aside from Epona’s soft hoofbeats in the dirt, there was no sound. Not even a breath of wind stirred the canyon’s stillness. The silence was oppressive.

But Link heard nothing, saw nothing. The rocky outcroppings hid whoever spied on them.

When the narrow walls opened into a valley, a slow-moving river cutting through it, Link risked stopping. Epona bent her head for a drink, her ears pricked. Link dismounted, tentatively refilling his own water supply. A rotting wooden bridge spanned the river a few yards down. 

“What do you know about this place?” Link asked Tatl.

“Not much,” she said, glancing over her shoulder. “It used to be its own independent kingdom, centuries ago. As far as I know it’s entirely abandoned. It was entirely wiped out during a war.”

Across the river, Link discovered the truth of Tatl’s words. A town’s remnants were strewn across the valley. Houses, now only piles of rubble, were dotted along the river’s shores. The remains of a stone wall circled the old village, now just dust and loose pebbles. In every house was discarded debris and a fine misting of ash.

Half-buried next to the water were the smashed pieces of a child’s wooden music box, the innards rusted, the painted outside charred black.

“Link,” Tatl said, her voice pitching higher. “We should leave this place.”

“What’s wrong?”

Her wings fluttered. “Can’t you feel that?” she asked, shivering. “I can feel despair all over this place. And I can sense a thirst for blood in the air…”

Link sensed the supernatural shift in the air as Tatl’s words left her mouth. In a practiced motion he was upright from his examination of the music box, sword in hand ready to defend himself.

The sky had darkened, plunging the valley into a stygian night. Four pairs of green eyes shone in the gloom, focused on Link. With soundless steps they approached, circled, the glint of metal in their hands giving away their intent.

Link circled slowly, keeping his shield on his back to protect him. His attackers were small, nimble, and wearing cloaks the same hue as the mountains around them, camouflaging them.

“It’s them,” Tatl whispered, horrified. “Link, those things…they’re not alive.”

Shock sliced through Link’s confusion. The ninja to his left crossed its thin blades, leaping at Link with inhuman speed and agility. The crash of their swords as Link blocked the hit vibrated painfully through Link’s left arm.

Undeterred, the ninja jumped back, waiting patiently for the next opportunity. 

“They’re Garo,” Tatl said shakily. “Spirits of the ancient spies who fought against the Ikana. It’s their thirst for blood that drenches this place. Link…I don’t know how to defeat something that isn’t alive!”

Her shrill voice distracted Link, who suffered another quicksilver attack that left shallow cuts on his arms. Although the Garo were spirits, they were no less real. Link had fought the undead before. Stalfos were hardy. Poes mischievous. ReDeads were cunning, but these undead assassins set shivers down the back of his neck.

“Close your eyes!” Link shouted, reaching into a pouch on his belt.

Tatl squeezed her eyes shut, and Link slammed a deku nut on the ground, emitting a burst of light so blinding in the darkness that the Garo’s light-sensitive eyes were scorched. The screams the Garo let out were as chilling as a ReDead’s shriek.

Grabbing Tatl, Link broke through the circle and ran, the pitch dark brought by the Garo receding until he could see again. A dirt path leading away from the village took them up into the hills. There was no sound from their pursuers, but he knew they were coming. The Garo’s presence was a poison gas of dread in the air.

Dotted throughout the hills were markers of stone and wood, the names inscribed on them almost illegible from age. The village cemetery. On the highest hill was a gatehouse, still intact and sealed, blocking the way ahead. 

Link pushed back the burn of fear and adrenaline in his lungs, the scream of aching muscles. He just needed to make it a bit farther. They were close behind now. A needle-like sword whipped through a tree next to Link, buckling the wood.

Link pressed on, Tatl’s panicked breaths in his ear. He reached the gate, grabbed its rusting bars.

Oppressive darkness exploded around them. The Garo descended from the air, shadows of death encircling them. Link turned, and a wedge of flame cut between him and the Garo, forcing them to retreat.

Backing away from the flames, Link looked up to see a spectre even more terrifying than the undead assassin-spies chasing him. A stalfos warrior, 12 feet tall and hefting a sword of flames, bore down on the four Garo. Wearing a skeletal leer, it lowered its head, its jawbone lowering so it could release a howl that turned Link’s blood to ice.

The Garo raised their weapons, not backing down from the huge stalfos. From the black haze, dozens more Garo appeared to join them. Dozens of smaller stal fighters gathered at their master’s feet. As one, they charged the invading Garo, a clash of undead warriors. 

The battle was over in seconds. Garo blades hacked and sliced the stal soldiers, reducing them to piles of bones in the dirt. Stal fighters decimated the smaller ranks of the Garo, but the ninjas vanished without a trace once beaten. The stal leader’s flaming blade swathed through their ranks, but never once singing the grass. The light illuminated the ancient armour he wore, the general’s helm on his skull. As the tide turned, the veil of darkness dispersed, bringing back the dim glow of dusk.

Link straightened when the stalfos’ orange eyes turned to him, one by one. Their leader, his sword extinguished, reached him in two huge steps.

“I am Captain Keeta,” the stal general said in a voice as rough as sandpaper and cool as glass. “Leader of the Ikana Kingdom’s forces. Who might you be, mortal?”

“Link,” he introduced himself, despite Tatl’s shushing. “I’m here to see the Guardian of Ikana Canyon.”

Keeta regarded him with suspicion. “Ikana has no guardian but me,” he replied. “And my men, who remain loyal to me even unto death, as you have witnessed.” He gestured to the battlefield, littered with the remains of his stal soldiers and the graves of the people of Ikana. “You trespass where you don’t belong. Only the dead remain in Ikana.”

With a nod from Keeta, two stal soldiers came forward, grasping Link’s arms in their bony grip. 

“Wait!” he called as the soldiers dragged him between them. “I’m here to help! What happened to this place?”

Captain Keeta gave him a look that might have been incredulity but looked more like a sneer on his bony features. “Ikana is a cursed kingdom, mortal,” he growled. “Begone from here. You don’t belong.”

“I’ve broken curses before,” Link challenged, fighting the inhuman strength of the undead soldiers. “It is the dead who don’t belong here.”

Keeta’s eyes blazed with fury. “Ikana may have fallen long ago,” he rasped, “But my duty remains to protect it. So long as the Stone Tower remains open and the Garo continue to plague this land. I cannot rest while our kingdom remains in danger.”

“Please,” Link said. “Tell me about the curse on Ikana. I will do everything in my power to help you and your kingdom. 

Keeta stared at Link for a long moment, orange eyes unreadable. “Our kingdom was once great.” He lifted his gaze to the hills below. “I should like to see the sun rise on Ikana once more.”

The stal general lifted a hand. “Release him.” Keeta’s soldier obeyed, reforming their ranks and saluting their commander. “Young man,” he addressed Link. “I shall tell you the way into the Ikana royal palace. In exchange, I ask that you banish the darkness in the Stone Tower, and free us from eternal unrest.”

Copying the motions of the soldiers, Link saluted. “I will.”

“At the mouth of the river is a passage that will allow you behind the palace walls,” Keeta explained. “From there, you will be shown the way to the Stone Tower.”

His instructions given, the stalfos knelt and plunged his hands into the dirt, digging his way back into the earth to wait for the next battle. His troops followed suit, burrowing with supernatural speed until they were completely covered, leaving nothing but overturned soil.

Link returned to the river, where Epona was waiting safely on the other side of the rotting bridge. Wisely avoiding the danger. Link gave her neck a few pats and she bumped her nose against his shoulder.

“It’ll be best to leave her here,” he said to Tatl. When the fairy didn’t respond, he glanced back to see her staring at him.

“I don’t know what it is about you,” she muttered. “It’s like nothing fazes you. And people—er, stalfos—seem to trust you.” She shook her head. “I wonder what it is about you.”

Rattling through numerous possible responses, Link settled on a noncommittal shrug. Tatl’s expression was thoughtful and wary, but she followed when Link led Epona to a secluded corner of the river and stood on the bank. The slate grey water rushed past a few feet below, cutting a tunnel into the rock, leading on into blackness.

Link held his breath and dropped into the icy water.

**********

He lay on the cottage room, snow melting in piles around him, the sun beating down. Below, Dark could see Sienna traipsing into the woods. At the edge she stopped, snow boots stirring up the slush. She reached back to remove her hood, letting her brown curls drop around her shoulders.

Her head started to turn.

The scene stuttered, shifted. Sienna was walking towards the woods again. She stopped. Lifted her hood. Turned her head. She wouldn’t look back. The scene started over.

_“Stop fighting me.”_

Sienna kept walking towards the woods, her back to him. She never reached the trees, walking endlessly. The snowy woods dissolved. Above Dark was a black ceiling of rock.  
Sharp pain exploded in his chest and head. 

The barn was on fire. His mother clutched his hand, pulling him away from the storm of flaming arrows. Her hands were cold as ice. His infant brother was clasped in her arms.

“Don’t let go!” she called to him, as he pulled his hand free.

Dark saw his hand moving back to hers, the look of fear stamped on his mother’s face. The firelight making her eyes gleam. Suddenly he was farther away from her; she was still reaching out for him.

“Don’t let go!”

_“Go. Find him.”_

Dark ran for the house, ignoring his mother’s pleas. There was something important back at the house.

He dashed through the back door. The kitchen materialized. His father stood, sword drawn, his back to Dark.

 _No,_ Dark thought. He forced his feet to turn. He ran out of the house.

_“Stop! Go back!”_

The voice tugged and pulled at him. The grass transformed into quicksand. It swallowed Dark before he could cry out, drowning him. Then he was falling, so swiftly he couldn’t draw breath.

He landed in a new memory. Link sat across the fire from him, tearing into the fish they’d caught for dinner.

_“Finally, you listen. Now find the others.”_

The voice intruded on Dark’s pleasant conversation with Link. He tried to swat it away, but it pervaded his mind, smothering his own thoughts beneath it. The voice wanted him to continue searching. Dark wanted to stay where he was.

While the voice continued to rail, Dark focused on pushing it aside, flexing his mental will until it was gone completely. He experienced a moment of relief before the earth swallowed him up again.

A splash of cold water struck his face. Dark gasped, inhaling, and began to choke. He leaned to the side, coughing and shaking the water from his lungs.  
His throat burned; his limbs were weak and shaking. He collapsed, unable to hold himself up any longer. On the cool stone floor he lay, squeezing his eyes shut and praying it was over.

“Yet again you disappoint me,” the sorcerer’s raspy voice said.

Lacking the strength to move, let alone speak, he didn’t answer that Alatar’s disappointment in him was a true victory in his opinion. Once again he’d stalled whatever the mage’s twisted plot was. Once again, he’d resisted Alatar meddling in his mind.

Thin fingers threaded through Dark’s hair and gripped it tight, yanking his head back at a painful angle. Dark cried out, slapping feebly at the mage’s hand as he yanked hard, dragging his captive across the floor. 

“I can see I will have to begin using stronger methods,” he murmured to himself.

Dropping Dark on the floor a short distance away, he kicked him inside the cell and closed the heavy door with a clang. Rubbing the sting out of his scalp, Dark then let his tired arms drop to the floor. There was a cot in the cell, but he couldn’t summon the strength to get on it.

If Alatar thought starvation, beatings, torture and mind-warping magic wasn’t enough to break him, he didn’t want to know what else the mage would try. While Dark’s body was weaker than it had ever been, he knew his mind was still strong. It was his last remaining defense against his captor. He couldn’t be allowed to breach it.

If he did, Dark would never survive. He didn’t expect to live through this ordeal, but he would prefer to die having foiled his enemy’s efforts than allow Alatar to use Dark to hurt the ones he loved any more.

In all the times Alatar had sifted through Dark’s memories, he’d been fixated on certain people. Link. Zelda. Ganondorf. Dark certainly didn’t love Ganondorf, but he would rather not relive any of his memories of him.

After an hour, perhaps two, Dark found the willpower to crawl off the floor. Next to the cot, the rock was damp—a trickle of water eked through from some unknown source, causing a constant dripping sound. Pressing his mouth to the wall, Dark let a few drops pool on his tongue and slide down his throat. He’d long gotten over the taste.

Sighing, Dark laid down on the bare cot, listening to the muted drip-drop. Sleep was always elusive after his mind was pried into. He suspected his subconscious wanted to remain vigilant.

Resting one arm under his head as a pillow, Dark let his eyes close. Exhaustion must have overridden his mind’s desires because he was woken sometime later by the clanging of his cell door opening.

Dark didn’t bother to move from the cot. Alatar’s enchanted shackles flew into the cell, wrapping themselves around his ankles, wrists and neck. They yanked him upright by force, marching him out into the room beyond.

Alatar sat engrossed in a leather-bound book. The shackles did their job for him, throwing Dark to the floor and bolting themselves into the stone. They didn’t dissipate as they normally did, though Dark was too weak to fight. He suppressed a shiver from the mage looked up from his tome with a smile. He must have found the answer he needed.

“Well, then,” the sorcerer said, coming to stand over Dark. “Let’s begin.”

**********

“Link, I need you to do something for me.”

He stopped and lifted the lantern in his hand. They were underground, in the tunnel that was supposed to lead them inside the walls of Ikana palace. Tatl, the faint light of her wings pale compared to the vibrant orange glow, hesitated.

“You’re strong enough to beat Skull Kid when we finally face him—I need you to make sure he can’t hurt people any longer,” she said in a blur.

Shocked, Link said, “He might have been a trickster, but he’s under the sway of Majora’s Mask. 

Emotions Tatl had been locking away burst from her.

“I’ve seen what he’s done!” she shouted. “He’s hurt so many people, ruined so many lives! He hurt Tael! He abandoned me, his friend! You think he deserves my forgiveness?”

Deflated, her wings drooped. Tatl huffed. “I know you don’t understand.”

Link looked away. “I’m sure some of my friends think I abandoned them to come here. I know I probably hurt some people.”

“Then why did you come here?” Tatl snapped.

Link opened his mouth. Closed it. He sighed. “I was…looking for someone. A friend.”

If he was being honest, Link wasn’t so sure that some universal force hadn’t brought him here, instead. In the forest, the place that had always been a sanctuary for him, he’d only felt lost. Alone.

_He was hiding … He said he’d been fighting with his friends and they’d left him alone._

Did Skull Kid feel the same way as Link? Like he’d lost someone? Like he’d lost himself? Instead of running away, was he lashing out at everyone?

He and Tatl continued in silence, emerging from the tunnel into the outer courtyard of the palace. Unlike Hyrule Castle, which had been built for beauty with its pure white walls and numerous spires, Ikana palace was built for defense. Its walls were flat and brown to blend in, its towers square and strong. The outer courtyard was surrounded by a guard wall, protecting the interior building.

The red-orange light of the never-setting sun bathed the murals on every wall, breathing life into the scenes and patterns depicted in crumbling paint. Age and war had taken their tolls on the palace, just as in the village. The sensation of desolate emptiness permeated everything here, too.

Link glanced up at the omnipresent moon, a great mass of rock, waiting to drop at Majora’s command. Over the past three days—weeks?—it had become almost normal. A sinister presence he’d grown used to.

He wondered how the people of Clocktown felt, having Majora’s threat literally hanging over their heads. Helpless? Hopeless.

The people of Hyrule had once been in the same position. And Link had saved them. Now, his heroic deeds were forgotten by all but a few. Hyrule didn’t know what Link had done. What had been sacrificed for them.

Looking around the empty palace courtyard, Link wondered if Hyrule would one day succumb to the same fate as Ikana. Would all his efforts be for nothing?

“This way,” Tatl urged, leading him to the broken gate of the interior structure.

The inside was as abandoned as the outside. If more of Captain Keeta’s loyal soldiers wandered the halls after death, they didn’t show themselves.

Tatl’s instincts drew them to the centre of the palace, where a dark, rectangular hall greeted them. To the left, long curtains dropped from the ceiling to slate grey floor, which was partially covered by a moth-eaten rug stretching from the entrance to the dais at the far end.

A stalfos sat on the throne, its head drooped, as if the weight of the crown it wore was too much for bones to bear. The reanimated skeleton was clothed in the tattered robes of a monarch, adorned with the jewels of a king. 

Hearing Link’s approach, the long-dead king of Ikana lifted his head. Unlike most stalfos, his eyes blazed virulent green, his toothy grin more unsettling than welcoming.

“You dare trespass in my kingdom?” the stalfos demanded, rising to stand. Ikana’s king, in life, had been an impressive figure.

At his side was a sword, worn with age but ready for use. The king wrapped bony fingers around its hilt and drew it free from its holder with a scraping sound.

“I am not here to fight you,” Link replied, in as firm a voice as he could manage. “I’m here to help Ikana.”

Ikana’s king laughed, seeing only a mortal child. “Ikana was damned long before you, boy. Our history is long and blood-soaked. This—” he gestured to the desolate hall— “Is our penance for our misdeeds.”

He lifted his weapon, staring down at Link, expression twisted with centuries of anger, pain and grief. “Let the gods witness that Igos du Ikana accepts his punishment.”

Link leapt out of the way as the stalfos’ sword crashed into the stone floor where he’d been standing, cracking the stone and spraying dust into the air. Igos stalked through the cloud, poised for another swing. 

Link feinted and tried to create an opportunity to slide under Igos’s guard—he was outmatched in size and strength, but the king couldn’t swing his sword effectively in close quarters. Igos tracked Link’s movements, striking with surprising speed. His next attack nearly cleaved Link in two.

Panting, Link instinctively patted his front where he’d felt the whoosh of the blade close to his skin. Igos marched on, never tiring, never relenting in his attacks. Link danced backwards, evading each swing of the deadly blade, waiting for an opening. It came when the blade smashed into the floor again, burying itself deep. Link ducked behind the struggling Igos, ramming his sword upwards inside the stalfos’ ribcage. Though they were skeletons, stalfos hearts were vulnerable, the organ still present—a macabre lump of flesh in a cage of bone.

Igos shrieked, abandoning his weapon. He whirled on Link, swiping at him with clawed hands. Link dodged, skirting his reach and chancing another hit to Igos’s chest. Screaming in fury, Igos whacked Link, who went careening into the wall. The curtains buffeted the collision with solid stone, but he gasped anyways, the air shoved from his lungs.

On his hands and knees, Link crawled for his sword, dragging the hem of the curtain with him. A sliver of light knifed into the hall, branding Igos. The king howled, cowering from the light.

Thinking fast, Link left his sword and seized his bow, aiming straight for the curtained window.

Link forced his will into the arrow, watching the end alight with magical flame. 

“Stop!” Igos commanded.

The flaming arrow ignited the tattered curtain, setting it ablaze. It burned quickly, as if feasted on by thousands of fiery termites, revealing the window behind. Beams of light fell upon Igos, whose body, punctured by the sunset, dissolved as he shrieked in agony.

Disembodied, his skull flew in a circle, conjuring a cyclone that whipped up dust and stone shrapnel. Trapped in the eye with Igos’s head, Link used his shield to protect himself. Slivers of rock sliced his skin, the wind raged. His boots slipped back, the wind snatching at his clothes, trying to pluck him from the floor. An invisible force threw Link free, and he landed painfully back on the floor.

Igos roared, caught in the centre of the cyclone. Link’s sword lay at his side, his bow in his hand. There was another curtain he could burn away. Another dose of light would defeat the king. 

Igos’s cry grew until it overshadowed the wind. He was no longer angry, but despairing, lost.

Link remembered the eyes of the deku butler, drooped in grief. Darmani, expression cloaked in misery. Mikau’s voice, full of pain and regret. Link looked at the king of Ikana in his haunted kingdom, unable to find peace.

He remembered Tatl’s words: _Why did you come here?_

Link reached for his ocarina. 

The slow, soothing notes of the Song of Healing were heard by Igos even through the storm. The wind slowed, shifted, and died. A shower of powdered stone fell around him.   
Piece by piece, Igos’s skeleton knit itself together again, reattaching to his skull. He turned to Link, eyes inscrutable. As his body healed, so too did his soul. A flicker of the man Igos used to be could be seen.

Link lowered the ocarina, waiting with a held breath for the king’s response.

“This kingdom fell because we lost something in our hearts,” Igos said. His voice was strengthened, authoritative, now restored. “We lost faith in one another. And once the doors of the Stone Tower were thrust open, the winds of darkness blew across this land.”

“I’ll close the doors of the tower,” Link told him. “If it’s sealed, the curse should break.”

“You are mortal,” he replied bluntly. “You will falter in the darkness, as all my soldiers did. As my people did.” He regarded Link. “You carry a light with you, boy. But it is not enough. The tower is a stronghold—I was not able to conquer the forces of its ancient evil.”

“I have faced darkness before. I’m not afraid.”

“The spirits of Ikana’s enemies may still wander there as we do,” Igos warned. “The ancient tribe who cursed Ikana…you have not seen evil such as theirs.”

Walking back to his throne, Igos thrust his blade back into its stand. “You have a mortal heart,” he said to Link. “They will corrupt you as they corrupted the hearts of my people. But if you will bring the light back to my kingdom, I will grant you the protection you need to enter the Stone Tower.”

Link approached the throne, sheathing his weapon and bowing his head. Igos sat down, gripping the wide arms of the throne. To Link’s surprise, the king opened his mouth and began to sing in a deep bass. The notes fell like stones on hard earth, echoing hollowly. At Igos’s feet a mask appeared, the same stormy grey as the floor. Link took the mask when it was handed to him. A stoic, masculine visage was etched into the stone mask.

“Remember this song to call forth a soldier with no heart,” Igos said. He nodded at the mask at his feet. “Take this with you to guide you into darkness. Shine light on Ikana once more.”

With those parting words, Igos du Ikana burst into green-blue flames, his stalfos spirit evaporating into nothing. 

**********

Dark’s heart pounded in his chest. He was back in Ganondorf’s tower, staring helplessly as Alatar threatened the woman he loved.

Sienna knelt on the floor, chains chafing her wrists, her tear-streaked face pale with fear. 

“Kill her,” the sorcerer commanded.

The shadows clamored to reach Dark first. They bit into his skin, clawed him open. He resisted, but his body wasn’t under his command any longer. He took a step towards Sienna.

“Kill her,” Alatar hissed.

Dark held the knife in his hand. Sienna stared up at him, pleading, crying. The shadows swirled around him in a haze, tainting his heart. His fingers tightened on the hilt.

“Obey me!”

Dark twisted in agony as his resistance caused the scar to burst as if pierced by a white-hot blade. The shadows coaxed him closer. He saw his hand grab Sienna’s hair.

_No, this isn’t what happened._

“Yes. You killed her.”

_No! I didn’t…I wouldn’t_

“Kill her.”

Dark jerked the knife. Blood sprayed his face. Her hair slipped from his fingers.

_No! No! NO!_

Dark screamed so loud he thought he’d gone deaf. Alatar’s voice kept speaking; he didn’t hear it.

The memory of Sienna’s death faded, to be replaced by a carnage. Dark saw himself in the woods, blood on his hands, trails of it staining the ground. He saw himself walking through an unknown village, terrified people fleeing in his wake. He saw a road full of bodies, and a bloodied sword in his hand. The scene of Sienna’ death replayed over and over.

_Stop! STOP. STOP. STOP._

“You are a Shadow now. Your only purpose is to serve me.”

Numbness settled over him. Sweet, endless darkness covered him. The horrific memories stopped. 

“See? Obey me, and the memories will not trouble you. Let yourself go…Free yourself.”

He was slipping deeper into that unfeeling oblivion. It would be so easy; so much better. He wouldn’t have to think anymore. Wouldn’t have to feel.

Sienna’s fearful face blinked in front of him. Sienna. She needed him. He couldn’t go yet.

Something pricked the back of his hand, slicing through the numbness. The sensation was a rush of energy, flooding his veins and pumping into his heart. Dark’s eyes snapped open. Alatar’s expression was slack-jawed shock.

“Impossible!” He backed away, watching Dark with a mixture of awe and fear.

Dark lunged after him, fingers itching to grab onto something vital and squeeze. A faint golden glow drew his attention to the back of his left hand. Dimly, the Triforce of Power pulsated there, driving away the pain, the shadows. It had dispelled the shackles holding Dark. 

He looked at Alatar, who responded by turning tail and fleeing. Dark growled, raising his hand. Magic struck Alatar like a cannonball, blowing a hole in the stone wall and knocking the mage into the room beyond. On Dark’s hand, the Triforce pulsed like a heartbeat.

The Triforce responded to Dark’s most immediate wish: _Get me out of here._

Belying the weakness of his starved body, Dark rose to his feet and sprinted through the hole he’d blasted into the wall. Cutting right down a curving staircase, he kept running, not sure where he was going and uncaring. The power writing in his veins guided him like an internal compass to where he needed to be.

At the bottom of the tower was a locked door. Dark lifted his hand and a burst of magic tore it apart. He ran through without a backward glance. Turning left, he followed the invisible path to the other side of the tower’s base, where a crack of multicoloured light split apart the square stones.

Dark plunged his hand into the light. It seemed to rush at him, consuming him, blinding him. The Triforce’s energy fizzled out, and the pain, fatigue and exhaustion slammed back into him.

Dark fell to his knees, gasping. Whiteness stung his eyes, and he blinked rapidly to clear it. Cold finally penetrated his fingers and knees and he realized—he was sitting in snow.   
Thinking he was back in the Dark World version of Snowhead, he jerked his head up, but he found himself in a forest, wholly unfamiliar. There was a light dusting of snow on the ground, covering the carpet of dead leaves. Half of the trees were bare, while some stubborn ones still sported leaves yet to fall. He was back in the Light World, he was sure of it. But seeing the evidence of the seasonal change caused nausea to turn his stomach.

He’d left Jeim’s near the end of spring. Searching his memories, they were hazy, but he remembered that much. If it was now late fall or early winter in Hyrule, he’d been held captive in the Dark World for months.

Dark picked himself out of the snow. He wasn’t wearing a shirt or shoes, and he had no wish to die in the cold. Without the Triforce’s aid he felt weaker than a newborn and unsteady on his own two feet. With each laborious step, he panted, his body burning despite the chill. He clutched at every tree he passed for support, hoping he wasn’t too far removed from the nearest village.

Time became irrelevant as the seconds stretched. It didn’t matter. He only focused on taking the next step, then the one after that.

His left foot dragged through damp leaves. His right foot caught on an exposed root, and he stumbled.

Dark tried to stop himself, but his arms held no more strength. The ground was surprisingly soft, fluffy with new fallen snow. He exhaled, watching his breath crystallize into frost. Then he slept.

**********   
_Termina, many years ago…_

Stone Tower was a fortress.

It rose even higher than the surrounding mountains, meeting the peaks of Snowhead in the distance eye to eye, a defiant challenger. Four sections huddled together, forming a hollow, square column in the centre. At the top, they rejoined to form an unreachable temple.

“Are you ready for this?” Tatl asked, looking skeptically at the long way up.

Though the tower must have long been abandoned, its traps and trials were in working order. Several stories above, boulders continued to roll along their ruts, sprung across the gap by ancient mechanisms, ready to squash intruders. On each level, on every side, were tunnels leading into the rock—no doubt inside was a labyrinth of passages.

“Silly question,” she amended, shooting him a sideways smirk. “After everything else I’ve seen you do?”

In his hands Link held the mask from Igos. He wasn’t sure what would happen if he tried it on, but it was too late to back out now.

He donned the mask, surprised when nothing happened.

“Did it work?” he asked, too nervous to open his eyes yet.

“It worked,” Tatl squeaked.

Link looked down to check for any changes, and reeled. His feet were still firmly planted at the base of the tower, but his head was brushing the top. If he stood on tiptoe, he could see the mountains of Snowhead. The mask had turned Link into a veritable giant.

With a shaking hand he grabbed the ledge in front of his nose; the entrance to the temple was just ahead.

“Wh-what now?” Tatl asked, flying around to face Link.

He tightened his grip and reached to take off the mask. Before Tatl could protest, Link pulled it off, this time experiencing the curious sensation of shrinking back to his original size. Mask in one hand, he dangled from the edge by the other. He climbed up, peering back down at the drop. Just like that, he’d avoided all the traps and the treacherous climb.

Tatl exhaled sharply. “You scared me!”

“This is pretty handy!” Link shook the mask, grinning.

“I really hope we don’t have to do that again.”

Inside the Stone Tower temple was a different world. Link had the weird sensation everything had been flipped on its end. Below him was the top of the structure, two stone bridges crisscrossing the twilight sky. Over his head he could see passages and platforms leading elsewhere. Across the bowl of indigo sky was the face of a stone demon, one eye socket empty, the other containing a shining yellow jewel.

Link stepped out onto the bridge, feeling a touch of vertigo looking down at the sky instead of up. A whirring sound snapped his attention in time to see a pair of beamos, their mechanical eyes locked on him. Twin lasers burned the ground, flying towards him.

Link ran forward, the beams crashing together in the middle of the bridges. The beamos whirled, readying another strike. Link ducked inside the mouth of the stone spectre, the beams hitting and showering him with dust.

When they paused their assault, Link chanced a look out to see where they were located. Both beamos were stuck to the floor—or ceiling—on the lefthand side. Link grabbed his bow and two arrows, then pulled out the bomb bag he’d acquired in Clocktown.

He’d met many of the people in Clocktown during the many replays of the three days. On one occasion, he’d returned to town late in the night and happened upon an old woman being robbed. After stopping her would-be thief, Link had been rewarded with the upgrade by the woman’s grandson, the local bombmaker.

Link tied two of the bombs to the arrows, lighting the wick and taking aim. Tatl screeched in protest at the stunt, but Link bit his tongue and aimed for the first beamos. The bomb arrow struck true, exploding the ancient machine. The second was met with the same fate.

“That was crazy!”

Link shrugged. “But effective. Sometimes you need to improvise. And I have a feeling we’re going to meet more enemies like that.”

As they delved into the temple, his prediction came true. The temple was infested with the same kind of mechanic monsters and traps, still operating perfectly after what may have been centuries.

“I wonder who built all these?” Tatl mused aloud. “The Garo? I imagine this was their stronghold centuries ago…”

Link kept his guesses to himself. He’d encountered enemies such as beamos before, in Hyrule. It was likely the Garo had once lived here, though. Unless Ikana had had other rivals? There was something about the temple that pricked at Link’s instincts, but he couldn’t place it.

“Link…I feel it again. The bloodlust in the air.”

Link drew his sword immediately. Whatever was watching from the shadows would have to come out and face him ready.

A Garo materialized before him, garbed in a purple robe rather than the dark cloaks of the others. In its hands it wielded twin blades, glinting with sharpness. Covering his face was a golden mask, with only two round eyeholes to see through.

Flame erupted along the edge of the Garo master’s swords, and he lunged. Link felt the strike against his own weapon at the last second, jolting him. He rolled backwards, avoiding the follow up attack.

Like the other Garo, their master was incredibly fast, his sword twirling like a silver tornado. Link withstood the hammering blows, waiting for his chance. After seeing the stalfos army take on the Garo in the canyon, Link knew the Garo were fast, but vulnerable. A few hits and they were no more.

Before the Garo could retreat, Link slashed at him under his shield. It retreated with a shriek, vanishing and reappearing behind Link. Tatl’s warning shout saved him from the attack, and he rolled again, hacking at the Garo master again. 

Enraged, the gold-masked Garo warped again, materializing at the other side of the room. He turned and retreated for the wall, his body going right through it. 

“Come on!” Link said to the astonished fairy.

He chased the Garo into the next room, which was dark save for a pair of torches flanking an altar. The master Garo knelt before it, murmuring words Link couldn’t decipher.

“Stop him!” Tatl urged.

Not needing to be told twice, Link slashed at its turned back. It slumped forward, its blades dropping at its side. Green flames consumed its body, leaving no trace.

“What was it doing?” Link asked, kneeling to inspect the altar. A curved blade was trapped in the stone, wrapped in chains. On the floor before it, the Garo master had drawn a handful of odd symbols.

The blade began to glow, the same eerie green as the fire that had consumed the undead Garo. Link backed away, ready for the next opponent. A shadowy form appeared above the blade. In noncorporeal hand, it clutched a long staff. It touched the staff to the blade’s edge, effortlessly prying it from its place.

The specter now hefted a scythe in skeletal hands. Its long, sweeping cloak covered an emaciated form; beneath its hood were two terrible, red eyes. With a shriek, it released a cloud of keese on Link and Tatl. They swarmed them, blinding them to the imminent strike.

The ghost caught Link with its staff, knocking him clear across the room. He skidded for a few feet before he stopped himself, lifting his shield to protect himself against the oncoming scythe.

“Not another ghost!” Tatl wailed.

“Find its weakness!” Link shouted back, dividing his energies between slicing through the swarm of keese and avoiding the attacks of the vengeful phantom.

Tatl swooped around the ghost, avoiding its howls and swipes. When it lifted its arms for a swing, the fairy spied the swirling green orb floating in its ribcage beneath the cloak.

“There!” she yelled to Link. “In its chest!”

Link absorbed another slash with his shield, smashing his sword against the scythe’s staff. It broke in two, and the ghost wailed, discarding the weapon and flying towards Link. He ducked, watching it soar around the room in a fury. 

Link gripped the hilt of his sword, holding his ground. The red-eyed phantom dove, coming straight for him. Link threw himself forward, sliding underneath the spectre’s transparent body and driving his sword upward. It cut the glowing orb in half. The ghost shrieked.

Rolling out of the way, Link watched the energy of the greenish orb, now released, form into the same spectral flames. They roared over the screaming phantom, turning it to ash.  
Link let his heavy shield and sword drop to the floor in relief. He’d done it.

Tatl whizzed by him excitedly. “Link, look! There are two masks here…that’s strange.”

Tatl was right; left behind was the golden mask of the master Garo, and a mask blacker than the darkest shadows, with two blood-red eyes. Without warning, a halo of light appeared on the empty altar, rising until it touched the ceiling. 

“The last Guardian,” Tatl breathed. “It must be.”

Gathering the twin masks, Link stepped into the circle of light.

The Guardians’ realm stretched before them, the misty valley less obscure than usual. The final Guardian waited for them, stepping out from the fog so he could be clearly seen.   
The Guardian was tall, with long, sinewy arms and legs that resembled gnarled tree limbs. Its head sat atop its limbs, with no apparent torso. It had a wrinkled, kind face with a pronounced nose and deep brown eyes. Moss covered its face and head like hair and a beard, contrasting with the nut brown of its skin.

Like the others, it spoke in its low, wailing language, then began to repeat the same song taught to them by the Woodfall Guardian. His message delivered, the Ikana Guardian retreated into the mist.

“What did he say?” Link asked Tatl, watching him go.

Tatl’s brow was furrowed. “He said…he said to forgive our friend.”

“Our friend?” Link frowned. “Does he mean theirs? Or yours and mine?”

“He must mean Skull Kid,” Tatl murmured. Her expression pinched with pain before hardening with resolve. “Let’s go, Link. We need to reach Clocktown before our time’s up. It must be the third day by now.”

Not wanting to push, Link turned, letting the portal bring them back to Termina. It left them on the outside ledge of the Stone Tower temple. The sky was palest blue, streaked with orange. Link looked towards the east, beyond the canyon’s walls. On the horizon’s edge, the brilliant sun was dawning.

Link smiled. The curse on Ikana was broken at last.


	6. Memory

Clocktown loomed on the horizon, the orange blaze of the setting sun eclipsed by the enormous shadow of the moon.

It hung just above the clocktower now, an inescapable threat. There were only hours left.

Link, Tatl and Epona raced towards the eastern gate, pulling up short at the stream of citizens coming through it, directed by guards.

“They’re leaving,” Tatl said, watching the families huddling together, the guards hurrying stragglers along. “They’re finally evacuating.”

“Hey!” a guard flagged Link down since he was riding against the current. “You can’t go back in there!”

“I left someone behind!” he lied, urging Epona into a canter.

The exasperated guards didn’t bother giving chase. Link steered Epona through the empty streets, seeing the closed doors and windows. There were few people staying behind now. Link’s first days in Termina, many of Clocktown’s had flat out refused to leave, not believing the Skull Kid’s threat to cause the moon to fall. The carnival organizers hadn’t even wanted to cancel the festival.

Now, the place had become a ghost town.

Link hopped off Epona in the middle of the South Clocktown square. The decorated booths and stalls had been abandoned, the carnival tower left unfinished.

“You should go,” Link said to the mare, stroking her velvet nose. “I know you’ll be safe.”

Epona nickered softly, bumping Link’s shoulder with her nose. With a whinny, she turned and galloped out the south gate.

“Will she be alright?”

Link nodded. Tatl glanced back the clocktower with a worried frown. “We can’t even open the tower until midnight. What do we do?”

Link looked around at the deserted streets. “We can look for anyone left behind. Try and convince them to leave—just in case.”

Tatl gulped, then nodded. “Who would still be here?”

Link turned east. “I can think of one person who might be.”

The Stock Pot Inn was tucked into a corner of East Clocktown, a small but affordable option for carnival attendees from out of town.

Inside, it was tidy and comfortable, if in need of some repairs—a grandmother with her share of creaking joints. The door was unlocked, so Link went on in, climbing the stairs past the lobby until he reached the innkeeper’s door.

Anju barely glanced up when he knocked and opened the door. She sat on the edge of one of the twin beds in the room, facing the door, hands folded in her lap.

“Anju?” Link asked, when she didn’t say anything. He noted the lack of light in the room, with only an open window providing illumination, the empty suitcase on the other bed.

“I’m going to wait for him,” Anju said, still watching the door. She reached up to tuck her short auburn hair behind her ears. “I made my decision.”

Link just nodded. His first night in Clocktown, Anju had given him a room in her inn when a guest hadn’t shown for his reservation. Those first few days in Clocktown Link had spent his time gathering the supplies he needed for the trip to Woodfall, and he’d learned Anju’s sad story.

Like many people in Clocktown, Anju had been a victim of the Skull Kid. Her fiancé, Kafei, most of all. The Skull Kid, with the power of Majora behind him, had cursed Kafei and forced him into hiding. Despite the threat of the moon falling and the protests of her family, Anju had decided to remain here and wait for Kafei, who’d promised to return to her.  
Anju reached up to hold the pendant around her neck—a message from Kafei, delivered by Link after he’d tracked down the man’s hiding spot in Clocktown. The message had swayed her to stay, and Link now wondered if he’d made the right choice in giving it to her.

“You can wait outside the walls of town,” Link tried. “He’ll find you.”

Anju shook her head. “We agreed to meet here. It won’t be long now.”

Link glanced out the window. The sun had set. The moon was sinking lower. There was little time.

In his pocket was the slight weight of the ocarina. Link hesitated, wondering whether to turn back the clock, give himself another three days to change what happened to Anju. But if he succeeded tonight in stopping Majora, wouldn’t she be alright?

The door creaked open. Link turned. Anju gasped. In the doorway stood a child with dark eyes and a solemn expression. Kafei, cursed to remain in the body of a child.

He met Anju in the middle of the room, and she knelt next to the bed. With silent tears running down her face, she embraced Kafei, murmuring words Link couldn’t hear.

He understood, in a way, Kafei’s situation. Link was also older than he seemed, stuck with a child’s face but the memories of another time, with knowledge of things no child should know. Everything in the other timeline had been erased—yet all the actions Link had taken in Termina were remembered, no matter how many times he used the ocarina.  
Being one of the few who remembered the fight against Ganondorf was isolating. The Sages had a shared connection. Yet there was only one Hero of Time. And the rest of Hyrule didn’t remember him.

On the floor, Anju and Kafei were exchanging their homemade masks—a wedding tradition in Termina during the Carnival of Time. Kafei had kept his promise to retrieve his stolen wedding mask and return to Anju. And he’d arrived just in time.

The earth had been quaking since the moon began its slow descent, but a fiercer shake rippled through the room. Anju gasped in alarm.

“You need to leave,” Link said, looking once more out the window. “It’s almost midnight.”

Anju and Kafei, hand in hand, grabbed their masks and left the room, leaving everything behind. Link followed them down the stairs. He stepped outside just as the clock tower bell sounded.

Link ran, the tolling bell sounding again and again, each time heavier than the last. Midnight.

In South Clocktown, the pendulum had already dropped, and the tower was open. At the top, Link and Tatl found Skull Kid and Tael, just as they’d been the first time. The painted wood of the clock face gazed at the moon, falling ever so slowly like a meteor hurtling in slow motion.

“Tael!” Tatl shouted. “We brought the four! We did as you said.”

The purple fairy shook in excitement. “The four Guardians?! You found them!?”

Skull Kid slapped Tael aside, throwing the tiny fairy to the ground. “Shut up, stupid fairy!”

“Skull Kid!” Tatl growled. “It’s time to stop all this! Take off that mask!”

Ignoring her, Skull Kid looked up at the moon. “I will finish what I’ve started,” he murmured.

As before, Majora’s Mask began to shake, emitting a wave of dark energy that swept over the. Skull Kid lifted his arms, letting out a shriek. The wave of magic was released, and the moon began to fall faster, gaining speed. It blotted out the stars.

Link grabbed the ocarina. This time, he didn’t play the familiar notes of the Song of Time. He closed his eyes and recalled the song the Giants had bellowed across a sea of mist.  
The notes echoed, carrying with them their own energy, seeking the farthest corners of the land. From the south, north, west and east, there was an answering call.

Skull Kid dropped his hands, his expression hidden by the mask, but his confusion evident. Far in the distance, four huge figures were marching towards Clocktown. They climbed over mountains, swam through seas, walked through forests, to join each other outside the walls of the town.

The four Guardians lifted their hands, catching the falling moon. With deep bellows, they stopped the descent, their legs bending, shaking with effort. A shockwave exploded outward, knocking Link and Skull Kid to the ground. Below the tower, the half-finished carnival tower, the wooden stalls were destroyed. Windows shattered.

Tael and Tatl crashed into each other in joy. Skull Kid and Link sat up, shaking off their dazedness.

“It’s over!” Tatl yelled at Skull Kid, releasing her brother and jumping back to anger. “You need to set this right! You’ve been a weak fool and you’ve hurt a lot of people!”

“Indeed,” the Skull Kid drawled in a low voice, quite unrecognizable. “I should have known he was too weak to properly wield my power.”

Link stepped in front of the fairy siblings as the skullkid rose into the air, his limbs dangling lifelessly. Majora’s Mask tilted, then shook violently, discarding the unconscious Skull Kid like a doll it no longer wanted.

“This puppet is no longer of any use,” the voice of Majora continued.

Link glared at the eerie mask, hovering above them. Tael and Tatl hung by Link’s shoulder, shocked.

“How is it speaking?” Tatl stammered. “It’s just a mask!”

“I am much more,” Majora seethed, its orange eyes glowing with supernatural light. “All will witness my powers…and I will consume this world.”

With that chilling promise, Majora’s Mask rose higher and higher. On the moon’s surface, a vortex of magic formed, pulling Majora in closer and closer until he vanished inside it. The vortex remained, a black hole on the moon’s pale face, beckoning Link.

Tatl vibrated with nerves. “W-what now?” she asked Link.

Link drew his sword and stepped under the eye of the portal. “We’re going to finish this.”

Tatl glanced at her brother, then the slumped form of Skull Kid nearby. With a nod, Tael flew over to check on their friend. Tatl turned to Link, determined.  
“I’m going with you.”

Link straightened to his full height and gripped the hilt of his sword tightly. Majora’s portal yanked them upwards and into darkness.

It was time.

**********

A toasty fire was crackling. The light of it danced against his closed eyelids. Whatever mattress he lay on was pure heaven, soft and piled high with blankets. The chill of the snowy woods was far away from him now.

Dark slitted open one eye, wanting to take stock of his surroundings before he alerted his rescuer—or latest, good-natured kidnapper; he wasn’t feeling generous—to his attention.

A man knelt at the hearth, innocently stirring a pot of soup. The house was ordinary, though it lacked the usual decoration or personal touches on the mantle, walls or furniture. The furniture was handmade, and sturdy, built to last. The soup-stirring man was much the same, with a large frame and roughened hands. 

Dark sat up in the makeshift cot in front of the fire. Hearing the rustle, the man glanced over his shoulder, throwing his features into profile.

“You’re awake,” he said in a deep, pleasant voice. Dark had been expecting a growling bass.

The man straightened from the fire, turning to face his guest. He was a very tall man, outstripping Dark by several inches, with short brown hair, square jaw and well-honed cheekbones. He was young, but the bristle on his jaw and his classically masculine features aged him a bit. No one would mistake him for a boy.

“Hungry?” he asked in his cheerful voice. A little smile turned up his lips, causing the corners of his pale eyes to crinkle.

“Starved,” Dark replied, with a wry smile in return.

The man chuckled, bending over the pot. “I believe that. When I found you, I was worried you’d already gone, you were so thin and cold.” He eyed Dark with a frown. “Were you lost in the woods?”

Dark accepted the bowl and spoon he was offered. He hesitated in answering, but he wasn’t sure where he was or if Alatar was already looking for him. He had no doubt the wizard had survived his attack and would renew his hunt for Dark.

The man pulled up a stool at his bedside. “I won’t press. I understand you must have been through quite an ordeal.”

Dark tried a spoonful of soup. “This is good.”

The stranger smiled. “My mother’s favourite. Never fails.”

“Where are we?”

“Ordon,” the man replied.

Dark almost choked on the soup. At least he was back in Hyrule, though he hadn’t made it very far. When he next asked his host for the date, his heart sunk even lower. He had been gone for months. No doubt by now Link was out searching for him as he hadn’t arrived in Hyrule as expected weeks ago.

“I need to send a letter,” he said, trying to get out of the bed. Dizziness struck him, and he nearly collapsed on the floor before his host caught him and gently pushed him back in the bed.

“Hold on now!” the man protested, concern creasing his forehead. “You’re in no condition to do anything. And the nearest village is miles away through the woods.”

“Someone will be looking for me,” Dark explained, fighting off the nausea induced by the dizziness. “I need to get a message to him before he worries anymore. I’ve been gone…”

His host frowned, no doubt putting some pieces together. “What’s your name?”

“Dark.”

“My name is Silas,” he said, keeping one hand on Dark’s shoulder to steady him. “I promise you, as soon as you’re well, I’ll take you into town to send your letter. Or I’ll go send it myself if you’re well enough to be left alone.”

Dark scoffed, rubbing his temples where they’d begun to throb. The measly two spoonfuls of soup were making his stomach turn. “I’m not a child.”

“Dark, I found you nearly frozen to death in the forest. You look like you haven’t eaten in weeks…I don’t know what happened to you, and I don’t need to know, but please trust me. You need to regain your strength.”

Dark blinked at him. “Why are you helping me? You don’t know anything about me.”

Silas sighed through his nose, taking the discarded bowl of soup. “Maybe not, Dark, but I have a good sense of people. Besides, what I know about me is that I never leave behind someone in need.”

While he crossed back to the fire to pour the soup back in the pot, Dark watched him, his headache building. Silas moved into an adjacent room, returning with a cup of water he pushed into Dark’s hand, then stood and watched while he sipped it.

“Thank you,” Dark muttered.

“You’re very welcome.”

“Where in Ordon are we?”

Silas sat down on his stool. “On my farm. Near the village of Taipa.”

Dark had never heard of it. Then again, Ordon was a small province of small farming communities. There wasn’t much here. It was quiet, peaceful. He took a slow breath. Right now, peaceful sounded very appealing.

Silas handed him a second bowl of soup and watched Dark for a few moments. “You’re welcome to stay here as long as you like,” he told him. “You look like you need the rest.” He grinned. “And not just from your jaunt in the woods.”

Dark sighed, setting aside the soup and laying back on the cot. Rest.

Right now, rest sounded like the best thing.

**********

Link was in a grassy meadow that rolled on forever. The grass was so green, so vibrant. The warm wind shushed over the plain, ruffling the blades like hands through a child’s hair. The sky was bright, azure blue. There was no sun, but there was light.

Everything was so bright.

Link blinked, trying to remember where he was. The moon. The moon had been falling on Termina.

A child’s laugh echoed over the meadow. There was a lone tree on a hill in the distance; a small figure ran around it in circles.

Link took a step forward, then stopped, checking to be certain his sword and other weapons had been brought through the moon portal. Tatl hovered nearby, as entranced by their strange surroundings as he.

When he walked toward the tree, Tatl followed. As they approached, the child slowed and stopped. He was barefoot, wearing a pristine white tunic and trousers that were too short for him. On his face, he wore Majora’s mask.

Link reached for his sword, not trusting the malevolent mask, and the spirit that inhabited it, not to be playing a trick of some kind.

“Is that your true face?” the Majora-child asked. Link stiffened in surprise. Did Majora know him? “I wonder what you look like under your mask?” the child pondered.

Link frowned. He wasn’t wearing a mask. He touched his face to be certain. What kind of game was Majora up to?

“Do you want to play a game?” the child asked eagerly. “I’ll be the good guy. You can be the bad guy. That’s okay, right?”

The boy stepped closer, holding out his hand. Link felt his fingers slowly release their grip on his sword. Something in him itched to take’s the boy’s hand. He stared into the yellow-orange eyes of Majora’s Mask, their virid irises pulling him in. Link let his hand drop into the boy’s.

He wasn’t sure how, but Link had the sense the boy was grinning under the mask.

Magic slammed into Link, wrapping around him like a constrictor. He gasped, unable to breathe in. The boy vanished; Majora loomed over him, cackling in a voice that no longer belonged to a child.

“Let’s play,” Majora said silkily.

Link struggled to breathe, barely hearing Tatl’s cries of alarm. Dark magic pressed in on him; his head was going to burst open. Majora was trying to force his way in. Link pushed back. His spirit was a spark of light, protected by a shield of his own energy, fighting back the inky blackness of Majora’s, prodding for weak spots.

“MAJORA!”

A new wave of magic cleaved through the connection between Link and Majora. The mask recoiled with a hiss; Link collapsed on the grass. Panting, he lifted his head, eyes widening as he took in the newcomer.

The Mask floated near the tree. Long tendrils had sprouted from it, swaying and coiling like snakes. Next to Link was the tallest man he’d ever seen, with snow-white hair and eyes so pale blue they were almost invisible. There were arrow-like markings on his forehead, and slashes across his cheekbones, two on each side. The man wore dark blue armour, etched with more strange markings, and wielded a gigantic blade in the shape of a number eight. The twisted blades, one pale blue and the other sea green, glinted in the bright light of the meadow.

“You’ve lost, Majora,” the man said in a calm, even voice.

The Mask vibrated, its tendrils waving aggressively. “Not yet, Destroyer.”

The man’s expression hardened. Link stood between the two, sensing the impending violence and unsure if he should be near it. Next to him, Tatl vibrated with fear.

When the man turned to Link, he almost backed up a step. “Link,” he murmured. Link gaped at him, dumbfounded. “I will lend you my power,” the man said. “And you can defeat Majora.”

Just as the boy had, the giant held out his hand. “Will you accept the power of the Fierce Deity?”

Link stared at him. The man emanated power, as Majora’s Mask did. Whoever, or whatever, this man was, he was powerful. And dangerous. Could he trust it?

The stranger smiled. “I can see you’re uncertain,” he said. “We have a friend in common. Your brother, Dark.”

Link’s heart stuttered in his chest. The pale stranger knew not only his name, he knew of his connection to Dark. A secret known only by a few.

He took the stranger’s hand. A surge of energy rocketed from their joined hands into Link, but it didn’t hurt, as Majora’s influence had. Whiteness blinded Link and he was held in limbo. The magic overtook him completely, transforming him, melding his power with another’s.

When he opened his eyes, the grassy meadow was gone. He was in a small, pentagonal room, every wall splashed with bright colours and graffitied with arcane symbols. Majora’s Mask floated nearby, watching.

“Our fight begins anew,” the malevolent Mask crooned. 

Majora’s tendrils twitched grotesquely. They grew, spreading out until they formed a reddish-purple humanoid shape. Across its chest, the yellow-orange eyes of the mask were emblazoned. Its face was demonic, with wild, white eyes and fangs jutting from its mouth. The demon’s arms stretched until they dragged on the floor, its fingers snake-like tendrils. Majora’s true form leered at Link, grinning madly.

Link lifted his sword, surprised to see he held the imposing figure-eight blade instead of his own. Majora no longer towered over him, but looked him in the eyes, thanks to his new height. Power rushed through Link, adding to his strength, his speed, his fortitude.

The demon Majora lunged. Link dodged, raising the heavy sword overhead. With a cry he brought it slamming down into Majora.

The demon howled as its arm was severed. It staggered backwards, shielding the stump, but soon the skin there began to ripple. The tendons in its arm raised under its flesh. The severed end burst open, and a new limb clawed its way out. Link felt a sickening drop in his stomach. Majora could regenerate.

“You cannot defeat me!” Majora howled, its fangs bared. “We are too many. You cannot destroy us.”

When Link spoke, it was with two voices—his own, strong and determined, and the voice of the Fierce Deity, speaking across countless ages with a reverberating echo.

“We will.”

Majora charged, lashing out with its taloned hands, its monstrous fangs. It tried to dance around Link, trap him in a net of dark magic. Link leaned on the borrowed power he held, letting Majora’s blows strike the impenetrable armour he wore, using the unbreakable blade to smash through the demon’s defenses.

Whenever Majora’s sinister magic threatened to overwhelm Link, the other force pushed it back, the Fierce Deity’s spirit protecting Link from succumbing to darkness.

Braving the oppressive waves of evil magic, Tatl helped where she could, shouting encouragement and tracking the demon despite its attempts to trick him. The sight of a fairy whizzing around his enemy’s head, keeping his focus, brought a smile to Link’s face. 

With a frustrated growl, the demon threw out its arms, morphing them into two long tentacles. It lashed out at Link, capturing his sword arm in a punishing vise. Unable to break free, Link was slammed into the wall, then the floor, dazing him. Majora’s arm transformed now into a scythe pointed straight at Link.

Link struggled to get away, but Majora was faster. The point of the scythe cracked through Link’s armour. Sensing a victory, Majora retracted its tentacles, readying for another strike. 

Link swung his body around and pushed off the floor, whipping the giant sword in a wide arc that cut through Majora’s tentacles. Gritting his teeth, Link readjusted his hold and plunged the sword into the demon’s heart.

Majora reeled back, clutched at its chest with its broken arms, shrieking with rage. Its body shuddered, trying to regenerate and heal itself. The sword pulled free, and Link swung again for its head. Thrashing side to side, Majora tried to avoid the blow, but the blade buried itself in its shoulder.

Too weak to free itself or regenerate, Majora fell to its knees, glaring up at Link. “This is far from over,” it seethed.

With a final cry of rage, Majora’s form threw back its head. Tremors shook the room. Cracks split the ceiling, breaking it apart. Oblivious to the danger, Majora went rigid, and bit by bit, he began to vanish.

Link crouched down, arms overhead to protect himself. Whiteness flashed, and the strength left his body in an instant. Exhaustion kept him from moving, even as the room kept crumbling around them. The Fierce Deity reappeared beside him, watching until Majora faded completely.

He turned towards Link, inclining his head. Tatl flew back to Link’s side as the stranger also disappeared inside a halo of light.

“What now?” Tatl asked nervously, as fissures erupted along the floor.

Link nodded at the faint circle of light showing through the cracks. “Just wait.”

Tatl’s anxious reply went unheard as the room broke open entirely, dropping the two of them into an empty space filled with stars. They fell, or floated, for a precious few seconds before light enveloped them once again, blinding them.

Somewhere in the abyss, Link swore there was music playing, echoing softly among the stars.

**********

“Is he dead?”

“Hush, Tael!”

Link cracked his eyes open. A wooden face with two orange eyes stared at him from above, flanked by two balls of light. Shocked, he jolted backwards and smacked his head on something hard.

“I told you he was fine,” Tatl grumbled, shoving the other two aside. “Link, you okay?” she asked, belying her first statement.

Link nodded, rubbing the sore spot. He’d been lying against a tree stump, which explained the bruise on his head. He managed to sit up, and Skull Kid and the two fairies gave him a bit of space.

Looking around, he saw they were outside Clocktown, near the swamp road. Several of the town residents were clustered nearby in groups, talking anxiously amongst each other. Epona grazed in the grass nearby, watched over by the little girl, Romani.

“What happened?” Link asked, feeling groggy.

“The Guardians stopped the moon from falling!” Tael crowed in excitement, whizzing around them. “Then you came down in a beam of light, and the moon was pushed back into the sky.”

“We did it!” Tatl grinned.

“What did you do?” Her brother asked, confused.

Skull Kid tapped Link on the shoulder. In his outstretched hand, he held the ocarina.

“Here,” he said meekly. “You dropped this when you fell.”

Link took the instrument, ran his thumb over its smooth surface.

“I wanted to say I’m sorry for all the trouble I caused you,” Skull Kid went on, kicking at the grass with his toe. “It was that mask…” He shuddered. “I’m glad it’s gone now.”

“It won’t bother you again,” Link promised him.

Skull Kid dared a glance at Link. "Thanks." He leaned in close to Link, sniffing at his clothes with a furrowed brow. Link raised a brow but said nothing. The Skull Kid studied Link's face. "I think I remember you..." he said slowly. "You smell just like that Kokiri kid I met in the Lost Woods...a long time ago..."

The skullkid tilted his head to the side, as if trying to confirm something.

"I made up with my friends,"he added. "When they left, I was really sad. The mask made it sound like it could bring them back to me. But I guess all I did was hurt a bunch of people…"

Link glanced at the milling townsfolk. The Skull Kid heaved a sigh, squaring his thin shoulders.

“I’m going to undo everything I did and help people from now on.”

“That sounds like a good plan,” Tatl said, overhearing.

The skullkid looked up at the two fairies hopefully. “Are you two going to stay?”

Tael and Tatl looked at each other, then back at their friend. “We’ll stay,” she agreed.

“We’ll help you make amends,” Tael added.

Skull Kid sniffed, rubbing his arm across his face, then both fairies collided with him. The three of them hugged, laughing as the force knocked Skull Kid to the grass. While the three of them played, chasing each other around in the grass, Link looked around at all the townspeople, starting to make their way home now that the danger had passed.

“You did well, young man,” a familiar voice chuckled.

The Happy Mask Salesman grinned down at Link. “You’ve helped a great deal of people here, haven’t you?” he asked, watching the residents of Clocktown.

Link the familiar faces going by, their hope and joy returning. Only three days had passed for them. For him it had been so much more.

“I suppose now you’ll return to Hyrule,” the salesman continued, pursing his lips thoughtfully. “Perhaps it’s time to say goodbye. For wherever there is a meeting, a parting must follow.”

The salesman’s grin faded, and he shrugged. “But who knows? No goodbye is truly forever, is it?”

He watched the skullkid and the two fairies continuing to play chase in the grass. He saw Cremia put her arm around her younger sister’s shoulders. A little farther away, Anju and Kafei, returned to his proper self, were embracing. The Clocktown guards were already organizing and escorting those who were making the trek back to town.

“Maybe I’ll stay for a while,” Link agreed.

His own carefree days seemed so far away just now. For so long, Link had had only his latest quest. Another mission. The next adventure.

Maybe it was time for a break. Just now, a rest sounded like the best thing in the world.

Besides, there was a Carnival to attend.


End file.
